


The Mop Log

by holtzbabe



Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: 50k of plotless fluff, Coauthored by my cat who sat on the keyboard several times, F/F, I only kept one of her lines but she still deserves credit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:08:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 50,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23977219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/holtzbabe/pseuds/holtzbabe
Summary: “Do you have a bucket list?”“You mean like a formalized list of things I want to do before I die? No. Do you?”Holtz tossed the machine that was in her hands up in the air and caught it again. “I don’t do lists.”Erin sat up straighter in her peripherals. “Holtzmann. Is that something that should be thrown?”Holtz paused to appraise it. “Definitely not.”
Relationships: Erin Gilbert & Jillian Holtzmann, Erin Gilbert/Jillian Holtzmann
Comments: 44
Kudos: 105





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> *Backs away slowly, finger pressed to lips*

“Do you have a bucket list?”

Erin took a moment to finish writing out the rest of whatever equation she was working on before finally looking up. “What?”

Holtz swivelled back and forth in her desk chair. “A bucket list. Do you have one?”

“You mean like a formalized list of things I want to do before I die?” Erin rested her pencil down beside her thick notebook on top of her perfectly immaculate desk. “No. Do you?”

Holtz leaned back in her chair, reveling in the familiar creak it made. Eyes on the ceiling, she tossed the machine that was in her hands up in the air and caught it again. “I don’t do lists.”

Erin sat up straighter in her peripherals. “Holtzmann. Is that something that should be thrown?”

Holtz paused to appraise it. “Definitely not.”

“So—”

Holtz tossed it in the air again. “It always struck me as so pointless, you know?”

Erin craned her head like an anxious peacock. “Not endangering everyone in the city’s lives?”

“Bucket lists,” Holtz said. “It’s like, why the hell would you make a list of all the things you want to do in your life when you could just _do them?_ ”

Erin had snuck up around the side of the desk and snagged the device out of mid-air before Holtz could catch it again.

“Hey now,” she said, “ _that_ was dangerous.”

Erin gave her a look and set the device gingerly down on Holtz’s side of the border between their back-to-back desks, but still out of reach.

“Not on top of plastic,” Holtz warned quietly.

Erin picked up the device.

“Or paper,” Holtz added before she could set it down again. “No, nope, not there either—it’s possible it’ll eat through my desk.”

Erin turned to her. “Eat through your _solid titanium_ desk? Are you kidding me, Holtzmann?”

“I think it plays nicely with mahogany,” Holtz said, peering around her.

Erin shoved the device back at her. “It’s not touching my desk.”

Holtz cradled it like a child. “See, me, when I want to do something, I just _do it_. I would never _think_ about it.”

Erin sank into her chair again. “No kidding?” she said dryly.

“So I don’t get the point.”

“The point of _thinking?_ ”

“Of bucket lists,” Holtz said.

“Why are you still talking about this?”

“Now, you?” Holtz pointed the device at her. “You were made for lists, and lists were made for you. Not as much as Venn diagrams, I would argue, but they’re up there.”

Erin sighed and picked up her pencil again.

Holtz continued to swivel. “Everything I’ve ever wanted to do in my life, I’ve done.”

Erin’s pencil scratched on the paper. Her way of pretending that she wasn’t listening anymore.

“I guess the one merit of a bucket list is that at the end of your life, you have something to show for it,” Holtz mused. “All those tick marks. That’s why people like lists, right? For the tick marks?”

“Unsubstantiated,” Erin murmured without looking up.

“Oh. _Ooh_.” Holtz sat up. “Now _there’s_ an idea, Holtzy.”

Erin’s gaze flickered up for the briefest moment.

Holtz drummed her fingers on the side of the machine. “What if there was a list that was, say, an anti-bucket list? An ongoing list of all the things that I’ve wanted to do, and then done?” She set the device down with a hallow thud. “Now _that_ could be interesting.”

Erin’s pencil rested still between her fingers, her neck stretching again. “Holtz. The—you—”

“It wouldn’t be a list, then. It would be a _log_. Oh-hoh. Yes, this is good. This is _good_.”

“You—your—” Erin pointed. “Your desk. Holtz—”

“Then at the end of my life, it’s not a list of everything I wanted to do before I died—it’s everything I _did_ before I died. But what would I call it?”

“ _Holtzmann_.”

Holtz scooped the device up and leaned back in her chair again, pulling her legs up to sit cross-legged. “What’s the opposite of a bucket?”

“A mop?”

Holtz pointed back at her delightedly. “Yes. The Mop List,” she tried, testing out the words. “No, I don’t do lists. The Mop _Log?”_ She threw the machine up in the air again and caught it. “Does that sound a little dirty to anyone else?”

Erin eyed her for several seconds. “Do you actually think so, or is that a mop pun?”

Holtz winked.

“It’s official, the Mop Log is a go.” She stretched her arms overhead, then sent the device careening in a perfect arch to Erin, who yelped loudly and scrambled to catch it. “Hey, _careful_ ,” she said, her legs coming untucked, boots hitting the ground with a thud. “That is a real, _gen-u-ine_ motor carefully and painstakingly extracted from a FurReal Friend. I only have ten.”

“Oh my _god_ , Holtzmann.”

Holtz leaned forward, elbows on her desk, chin on her fists. “So are you going to help me or not?”

“With _what?_ ”

“My Mop Log!” Holtz waggled her eyebrows. “It can be _our_ Mop Log.”

“You. Are insufferable.”

“I know.” Holtz leaned back again, folding her hands behind her head. “If I were a Mop Log, where would I want to be immortalized? Someplace nice, right? Somewhere appropriately permanent?”

Erin’s fingers twitched, and she sighed. “I think I’ve got an unopened Moleskine upstairs. You can have it if you want.”

Holtz beamed. “I’m touched, Gilbs.” She rooted around under some papers on her desk until her fist closed around a Sharpie, then spun around in her chair, surveying in front of her.

“Wait,” Erin said behind her. “No…”

Holtz uncapped the Sharpie with her teeth and scooted forwards in her rolling chair.

“No, _no_ , Holtzmann—don’t—Patty _just_ repainted!”

Cap in her teeth, Holtz lifted the marker.

The FurReal motor clattered to the desk, and Erin was right there, but the tip was already marking fat black letters with the satisfying squeak of Sharpie on paint.

_THE MOP LOG_

Holtz grinned up at her around the cap in her mouth.

Erin crossed her arms. “Patty’s going to kill you.”

Holtz turned back to her wall, scrawling again, then capped the marker and tossed it behind her with a clatter.

“But you love me,” she said.

Erin stared at the writing on the wall for a moment, then at her.

“Unsubstantiated,” she said.

Holtz grinned again and rolled back to her desk.

_1) Create a Mop Log_

-

“Hey. Hey Erin. Hey.”

When there was no response, Holtz lobbed a crumpled-up piece of paper at her. It bounced off her forehead and fell to her desk. Without looking up, Erin swept it to the floor.

“You need to pay attention to meeee,” Holtz whined. “I’m like Tinkerbell.”

“Tinkerbell needed people to believe in her,” Erin corrected, pencil flying madly across her page.

“Oh, I’m plenty self-assured,” Holtz said. “I believe in myself, baby.”

Erin bit her lip, frowned down at her notebook, and flipped her pencil upside down to erase something. She gently swept the eraser bits into the palm of her hand and then transferred them to the miniature garbage can she kept below her desk for such things.

Meanwhile, Holtzmann had dug out a half-eaten Slim Jim from underneath a pile of burnt wires, dumpster metal, and blueprints for a proton blowgun, and was gnawing on it. Her glasses dangled lazily between her fingers.

“When was the last time you took a break?”

Erin looked up, then pointedly over Holtz’s shoulder at the writing on the wall behind her. “An hour and a half ago.”

Holtz chewed thoughtfully. “I’m not getting any work done.”

“And you are hell bent on taking me down with you,” Erin said. She tapped on her notebook. “You know, this is actually very—”

“I have an idea for number two.”

“—important work, and if you care at all about ever building those plans you showed me last week, then you’ll let me finish solving this for you.”

Holtz hopped up from her chair and came around behind Erin, hooking her glasses over her ears. The Slim Jim hung from her lips. She clamped her hands down on Erin’s shoulders and bent over, gaze sweeping the page for ten twenty-eighths of a second.

“You forgot a two.” She tapped the page.

“What?” Erin straightened up, shrugging off her hands. “No I didn’t, I—”

“Also, I already built that. On Tuesday.”

“That’s impossible.” Erin leaned so close to her desk that her nose nearly touched down. “No. How? No.”

Holtz took the back of her chair and spun her around. “Come with me.”

“Where?”

Holtz held up a peace sign. “Numero dos.”

“ _Where?”_ Erin repeated.

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Then I’m not going.”

“I don’t have a specific destination in mind,” Holtz said. “This one is more about the going.”

Erin held her gaze for 3.6 seconds.

She turned back around in her chair, folded the cover of her notebook closed, unlocked the top drawer of her desk, and placed it inside neatly.

“You know you don’t need to lock up your pencils, right?” Holtz said.

Erin stood up and gave her a look.

“Me and my klepto hands are going with you,” Holtz pointed out, wiggling her fingers. “I can’t be two places at once. I’m working on a little something-something to remedy that, but I haven’t gotten there yet.”

“Do I need a coat?” Erin asked, grabbing her purse out of the bottom drawer of her desk. That, she didn’t keep under lock and key. The white-out, though? You needed a hall pass.

“Depends on if you consider 52 degrees to be cold or not.”

Erin hesitated. “Will we be outside long?”

Holtz shrugged, an exaggerated expression of befuddlement twisting her features.

Erin took her coat.

-

Once outside the firehouse, Holtzmann drew a large check mark in the air in front of her and danced a little jig in spot.

“Number two,” she proclaimed. “Convince Dr. Erin Gilbert to play hooky from work.”

Erin stopped beside her. “Wait, that’s it? That’s all? Holtzmann, I thought we were doing something _exciting_.”

“Ah ah ah, the Mop Log is in its infancy yet!” Holtz grabbed her hand, warm and sweaty, and tugged her haphazardly down the street. “And I just got the most _delicious_ brain baby to chase after for number three.”

“It concerns me when you use the word _delicious_ in the same sentence as _baby_.”

Holtz spun without breaking her stride, skipping along backwards. “You’re lookin’ _delicious_ , baby,” she hollered, a wink for good measure. “ _Ooh_ yeah.”

Erin, Ecto-roof red, stumbled along after her.

“You’re moving too fast,” she called.

“So I’ve been told.”

“Walking—you’re _walking_ too fast—I can’t—I don’t have the stamina, Holtz—”

“Information filed away for future use,” Holtz crowed, and came to an abrupt halt, Erin crashing into her.

“What are you—”

Holtz bent forwards, arms behind her. “Get on.”

“On your _back?_ Holtzmann, that’s not dignified.”

Holtz straightened, mouth widening into an O. “Are we aiming for dignified?”

“ _I_ am,” Erin said.

“That simply cannot stand,” Holtz said. “ _Dignified?_ ” She shuddered at the thought and dropped forward again.

Erin groaned, tightened her purse over her body, and threw her arms around Holtz’s neck to climb up. Holtz found purchase under her legs and hoisted her up.

“Don’t let me flash anyone,” Erin warned.

“That’s only a privilege for me, gotcha,” Holtz said.

“Did you just wink?”

“How could you tell?”

“I could hear it in your voice.”

“Ah, the verbal wink. The vink.”

“Why does that sound dirty?”

“Your mind’s really in the mop bucket today, isn’t it?”

“Are you going to move or just stand here?”

Like Erin could hear the wink in her voice, Holtz could hear the blush in hers.

“Onwards,” Holtz concurred, and set off ambling down the street.

“Am I heavy?”

“Why, I would never comment on a lady’s relative mass under exertion of gravitational force, Dr. Gilbert.”

“Am I heavier than a proton pack?”

“I know you know the simple mathematical answer to that. Unless this is a lead-in to chat about general relativity, but I’ve always thought that’s the kind of dirty talk that should be reserved for the bedroom.” She turned her head so Erin could see her smirk.

Erin sighed, breath warm against her neck.

“I was just wondering what the point of this was when you’re moving slower than we were before,” Erin said, adjusting her arms and accidentally exerting a little positive force of her own against Holtz’s windpipe. “I thought you were going to run. Or was this just number three on your list?”

“This is a mere footnote,” Holtz said. “You want me to run? I’ll run, baby.”

She ran.

Ten feet, then stopped.

“That was short lived.”

“We’re here.”

“ _Here?”_ Erin slid from her back and stumbled back a step, tugging down her skirt and looking up at the building in front of them, then down the block at the firehouse, then back. “Is number three to get food poisoning at 11:30am on a Tuesday?”

“Been there, done that, buttercup. The Mop Log ain’t about that past life, it’s about the now.” Holtz tugged the door open and stepped aside, sweeping her arm. “Après-vous.”

Erin grimaced and stepped inside, holding her head extra-tall in the way that she did whenever she was on-edge. Holtz came in after her and walked her fingers up her spine. Erin flinched away from her.

“Don’t _do_ that.”

“You bust _one_ little measly colony of spectral rats in a restaurant _one_ time…”

Erin’s gaze swept the grimy floor. “If they had spectral rats, they have living rats.”

Holtz pretended to dust off her hands. “Come on, my favourite table is open.”

Erin looked at her with abject horror. “Do you come here often?”

Holtz quirked an eyebrow. “Isn’t that my line?”

“How do you—Why would you— _How? Why?_ ”

Holtz pointed at the seat across from her as she sat down.

Erin shuffled over, scanning her surroundings the whole way, and took a seat stiffly. “If I see a rat, I’ll throw up.”

“Alive, dead, or living-dead?”

“All of the above.”

“You’re a terrible New Yorker.”

Erin muttered something that sounded suspiciously like _sorry I have standards_.

Her and her standards didn’t order anything. Holtz did.

While she ate, Erin looked around at the dingy walls. “I don’t really get it. Why is this number three?”

“This isn’t number three,” Holtz said through a mouthful of food. “This is a date.”

Erin nearly choked on all the not-food she wasn’t eating. “No. What? No. No.”

Holtz didn’t say anything, just shoveled another forkful of slimy hashbrowns in her mouth.

“No,” Erin said again.

Holtz held up four fingers, chewing.

“What?” Erin blinked at her, then shook her head to herself. “No.”

Holtz added a thumb and wiggled all five digits at her.

“You don’t need to count them,” Erin said, ducking her head as pink spread across her cheeks.

Holtz flipped her hand into a thumbs up.

-

“Can you hurry up so we can get out of here?”

Holtz was counting out cash to leave on the table. This place didn’t accept cards. Erin had already pointed out not once, but thrice, how seedy that was. “Why, you got somewhere you wanna go?”

“I want to go back to work,” Erin said.

Holtz dumped the bills and a pocket’s worth of change on the table. “Well I want to go fishing.”

“Fi— _fishing?_ Is that…are you…is that supposed to be a euphemism?”

Holtz looked up slowly with a grin.

Erin held up a hand to stop her. “No. But— _fishing?_ Like…like on a boat?”

“I’m not allowed on boats.” Holtz stood up. “I’m picturing me at the edge of a nice river. Or stream.” She mimed reeling in a line. “What’s the difference?”

Erin ushered her out of the restaurant, her jacket draped over her arm. “Between a river and a stream? Size, I think.” She turned left immediately, but Holtz caught her.

“You coming with?”

“To…you’re going fishing? Right now?”

Holtz gave a quick tilt of her head to the side, chewing on the arm of her glasses. “I was thinkin’ about it.”

“So you’re going to do it.”

Holtz winked. “No Mop Log entry otherwise.”

“Number three.”

“Number three.”

“Have you ever gone fishing before, Holtz?”

“Metaphorically?”

“No—”

“No. It’s like riding a bicycle though, right?”

“…Something you never forget how to do?” Erin’s brow crinkled.

Holtz returned her glasses to her face. “I’m sure I was a fisherman in one of my previous lives. Don’t I look like I would’ve been the village fisherman?”

Erin appraised her. “Blacksmith.”

Holtz shook her head. “I’m talking way back. Prehistoric times.”

“Not a chance,” Erin said. “Crackpot inventor of the tribe. You would have discovered fire.”

Holtz pounded her chest and let out an appropriately loud caveperson yell.

Erin ducked her head with embarrassment.

“So,” Holtz said. “Fishing?”

“I’m not dressed for a spontaneous fishing trip,” Erin said, looking down at herself. “If I had known, I wouldn’t have had a Tweed Day.”

“You’ve been having a lot of Tweed Days lately,” Holtz said. “Everything okay, Gilbs?”

Erin tugged at her sleeve. “Everything’s fine. It’s just a…comfort thing.”

Holtz reached out to thumb the material of Erin’s blazer.

“Not physical,” Erin mumbled. “Emotional.”

“Security blanket, gotcha. I’ve got one or two or ten of those in my wardrobe,” Holtz said. “I usually go for dual functionality, myself. Comfort squared.”

“Your t-shirts _are_ very soft,” Erin allowed.

“Steal ’em any time you fancy,” Holtz said. “In the meantime, this is the _perfect_ getup for you.” She booped Erin’s nose. “I happen to think tweed makes great camouflage.”

“You don’t need to dress in camouflage for fishing,” Erin said.

“What am I thinking of?”

“Hunting?”

Holtz waved her hand dismissively and set off in the opposite direction. “Wasn’t what I meant anyway.”

A second elapsed before Erin caught up with her. “What—”

“Camouflage,” Holtz repeated, reaching to tweak Erin’s blazer again as they walked. “I see you anyway, Erin.”

Erin tried to hide her smile. Tried being the operative word.

-

“Why are you naturally perfect at everything you do?”

Erin looked back over her shoulder at Holtz and let out a giggle. “What did you do?”

Holtz was tangled in her line. She windmilled her arms and succeeded in making it worse. She grunted.

Erin continued to laugh. “You’re making it worse. Hold on—”

She began reeling in her own neatly cast line, the picture of ease. Her blazer was folded tidily on a nearby log, the sleeves of her cacti-printed blouse rolled up carefully over her elbows. A faded camo-print baseball cap, purchased from the tackle shop where they bought their licenses and gear, was nestled over her ponytailed hair. Her always-impractical heels were remarkably stable on the rocky shore of the stream upstate that they’d selected. In short, Dr. Erin Gilbert: Master Angler.

She had finished reeling in her line, and had joined Holtz, gently setting down her rod so she could get to work disentangling Holtz with those impossibly long fingers of hers. She was methodical, her lip caught in between her teeth as she patiently followed the line up and around Holtz’s body, charting its path. Holtz had been two seconds away from slicing it clean off herself with everyone’s favourite utility knife. Patience was not one of her three middle names.

“You didn’t answer my question,” she said as Erin stepped around behind her.

“I thought it was a rhetorical one.” Erin patted her arm. “Lift this.”

Holtz obliged, and Erin scooped up the line that was looped underneath it and pulled it up over her head.

“Besides,” Erin said, “I didn’t think you were the type of person who cared about being good at things.”

“Correct,” Holtz agreed as Erin rounded her other side. “I’m having a grand ole time not knowing what the hell I’m doing. I’m just impressed by you, that’s all.”

Erin was right in front of her, inches between them. Her hand rested momentarily by Holtz’s collarbone. “I’m not perfect,” she murmured. Her eyes darted up from the line. “I’ve just done this before.”

Holtz beamed. “Aren’t you full of surprises.”

Erin resumed the task at hand. “My father used to take me and my brother out to Mud Lake when we were kids.”

“Really?”

“Well, he only wanted to take my brother. I pitched a fit about sexism until he agreed to drag me along as well.”

“Ooh yeah, that sounds like the Erin Gilbert I know. Didya ever catch anything good?”

“Nothing that impressed either of them.”

“Try me. I’m not your daddy.” Holtz raised her eyebrows. “Unless—”

Erin threw a hand over her mouth. Holtz licked her palm.

Erin grimaced and dropped it. “River bacteria, Holtz, really?”

Holtz poked her in the stomach, causing her to double over ticklishly. “Whadidya catch?”

“Nothing that big or exciting,” Erin promised.

“What was your favourite?”

“I always liked the Bluegills best,” Erin mused. She freed Holtz of the line at last, and stepped back. “There you go.”

“My hero,” Holtz gushed. “Now, will your Fishing Excellency please show me how it’s done?”

“I thought you didn’t care about doing it right?”

“Oh, I don’t. I just want to see if your method of instruction involves your clever hands touching anywhere on my person to guide me.”

Erin rolled her eyes, but walked her through casting her line in such a way that it wouldn’t end up wrapped hopelessly around her body.

Yes, there was touching.

-

Holtzmann caught a rainbow trout, and was delighted.

-

Erin caught six brown trout, and was too.

-

They traipsed through the doors of the firehouse, poles in hand, squabbling about the merits of crumbles versus crisps versus cobblers. Holtz didn’t know there was a difference. Wasn’t it just semantics?

The answer, as it turned out, was no.

Kevin had gone home for the day. They passed his desk and climbed the stairs, still arguing.

Upstairs was dark and quiet. Patty and Abby were gone too, then. The motion-activated lights came on as they cleared the top of the stairs—Holtz’s handiwork.

She dropped her newly minted tacklebox with a heavy thud on her desk, knocking something metal to the floor in the process, and tucked her rod into a nearby storage cabinet along with Erin’s (and a hundred tonnes of other crap that she had no other home for).

Erin stretched her arms overhead with a soft yawn. “I’m going to head out. I need a shower like nobody’s business. I stink like river water and fish.”

Holtz caught her wrist and stepped in close, burying her nose in Erin’s hair and inhaling deeply.

“Uh?”

Holtz pulled back, a smile playing at her lips. “Just checking.”

“If I stink?”

“If I’m into it,” Holtz corrected, her smile settling into something more suggestive.

“God, Holtzmann.” Erin weaseled out of her embrace. “ _Goodnight_.”

“Niiiiight,” Holtz trilled, watching her scoot off down the stairs.

Then she grabbed the Sharpie off her desk, humming to herself.

-

“Holtzy, what the _hell_ is that on my wall?”

Holtz spun lazily in her chair, following Patty’s pointed finger. It had taken all of thirty seconds from the time she set foot in the building for her to reach the second floor and accost her.

“Oh that? That’s a lure.”

“Not _that_ ,” Patty said exasperatedly of the feathered hook stuck to the wall with duct tape. “Why is there _writing_ on my _freshly painted wall,_ you fuck? _”_

“That’s a lure,” Holtz repeated.

Patty threw her hands up.

“Love you Pattyyyy.”

Patty was already leaving. “Love your infuriating ass too,” she huffed over her shoulder. She paused at the top of the stairs and looked back. “Oh, and the next time you ’n Erin feel like taking half the day off, at least tell us before you leave.”

Holtz saluted with a grin.

Patty rolled her eyes. “Come on, I got breakfast downstairs.”

“You are a truly phenomenal woman, Patricia,” Holtz said, hopping up from her chair and bouncing across the lab after her.

_2) Convince Dr. Erin Gilbert to play hooky from work 1_

_3) Go fishing_

_ 1  _ _Via piggyback_

-

“Good morning,” Erin said pleasantly as she began the Erin Gilbert Morning Processional of shedding her coat, shutting her purse in her bottom drawer, unlocking her top drawer and freeing her notebook and pencils, aligning them on her desk, and taking a prim and proper seat. She noticed the mug in front of her and pointed at it with a surprised and genuine, “Oh, thank you,” before taking a sip.

Then she began to cough violently, spitting liquid everywhere and bending over.

“That’s—” she wheezed— “not coffee.”

Holtz looked up from carefully connecting two wires, her boots up on her desk. “No, it’s not,” she said.

“What—” Erin continued to choke— “the _fuck_ is that?”

Holtz gasped with glee. “Something interesting enough to get you to swear? How unexpectedly delightful!”

“ _Holtzmann_ ,” Erin got out between coughs.

“Three parts 190-proof Everclear, one part ectoplasmic runoff,” Holtz said cheerfully.

“Are you making _cocktails?_ ”

“Of course not,” Holtz said. “I’m making _science_. Conducting a little experiment.”

Erin was still doubled over, clutching her stomach. “Is the experiment to see—” Cough— “what you can get me to drink—” Cough— “if you leave it disguised as coffee sitting on my desk? Because I will kill you _so hard_ that you’ll never—” Cough— “get to see the inside of one of those.” She pointed a shaky finger at a half-assembled ghost trap on Holtz’s desk.

Holtz leaned back in her chair with her hands behind her head. “That really does sound like something I would do,” she said merrily, “but no. You weren’t supposed to drink that.”

“Then why was it _on my desk?_ ”

“To be fair, I didn’t realize I left it on your desk,” Holtz said. She got up and came to pluck the mug from Erin’s grasp, peering into it. “Gonna have to start over. Unless I want to keep this one as a side experiment. See what Erin Saliva adds to the mix.”

Erin groaned.

Holtz surveyed the splatters of liquid all over Erin’s desk. “You’ll probably want to clean that off. It might take the finish off.” She tapped the side of the mug. “Ceramic is the only thing it hasn’t eaten through yet.”

Erin blanched. “I put that in my _mouth_ , Holtzmann.”

“It seems to do fine with organic material,” Holtz said. “You can go stick your head under the chemical shower if you’re worried.”

“My esophagus is _burning._ ”

Holtz waved her hand. “That’s just the ethanol.”

“Did you say _190-proof?_ Isn’t that _illegal?_ ”

Holtz grinned. “Not in the State of New York it’s not.”

Erin glared at her for several lengthy seconds.

“Hey, you want me to make you a cup of coffee?” Holtz asked brightly. “I’m heading to the kitchen anyway.” She lifted the ectothanol mug in the air.

-

“Holtzy sorry.”

“Holtzy is…forgiven so long as she promises to never leave anything on my desk ever again.”

“What about presents?”

“You and I have very different definitions of what a present is. So, yes. No presents.”

“Awe, rats.”

“No rats either.”

-

“I can’t help but notice you’re having another Tweed Day,” Holtz said, fingers interlaced underneath her chin.

Several hours had elapsed since the Great Mug Incident, as Holtz had dubbed it. Erin’s desk had been scrubbed of the evidence. She gargled enough water to drown a fish. No lasting damage.

Erin’s eyes were fixed on the page in front of her. She was continuing to work rather redundantly on the math from Holtz’s proton flamethrower, citing that she needed to know if it was going to blow up on them. Holtz preferred to find out that information by trial and error.

“Yes,” she said, pencil scratching. “I told you. It’s a comfort thing.”

“Does that mean you’re…” Holtz built her fingers into a steeple and leaned forward. “ _Uncomfortable?_ ”

“I share a lab with you, Holtzmann. I’m always uncomfortable.”

Holtz tipped her head on the spire. “Do _I_ make you uncomfortable?”

Erin’s gaze lifted. “Frequently.”

“In a bad way?”

A pause, and Erin shook her head. “No, Holtz,” she said with quiet resignation. “Not in a bad way.”

Holtz beamed.

Erin gazed past her at the Mop Log for the first time all morning. “I like the fly on the wall.”

Holtz’s mouth widened in disbelief. “Oh my god, the _pun_. I didn’t even _consider_ the pun.”

“You’re losing your touch.”

“I blame the river water. It seeped in through my ears and saturated my brain with gunk.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t have crawled to the edge of the bank and dunked your head under,” Erin quipped.

“That was for science.”

“You say that about a lot of things.”

“I’m a scientist, baby,” Holtz said with a wink.

“It makes me uncomfortable when you call me baby.”

“Patty calls you baby.”

“Yes, but I know that Patty isn’t trying to get into my—” Erin broke off, flushed, and smoothed her skirt down with her hands. “Tweed,” she mumbled.

Holtz’s grin stretched from one end of the lab to the other.

“I can’t believe you really counted that as number two,” Erin said, trying to distract her.

Holtz looked over her shoulder at the Log. “Why not?”

“If this is supposed to be akin to a bucket list—” Holtz had turned back, mouth already opening, but Erin held up a hand to stop her— “I _know_ , it’s not a _list_ , but if the general idea is that these are all the things you wanted to do in your life, then aren’t they supposed to be, I don’t know, significant? Exciting? The kind of thing that you would be remised if you didn’t do before you died? Like, skydiving, or something?”

Holtz quirked an eyebrow. “Skydiving, huh?”

Erin held up her other hand, a double-edged stop sign of _don’t go there_. “No. All I’m saying is that _that_ shouldn’t qualify.”

“Number one—” Holtz lifted one finger— “this is a Mop Log, not a bucket list. I make the rules. Number _two_ —” She added a second finger and saluted Erin— “is _very_ significant, exciting, the kind of thing I would be remised if I didn’t do before I died. Excuse you.”

“Oh come on,” Erin said.

“I got Dr. Erin Gilbert to play hooky from work,” Holtz said. “That will surely live on as one of my top achievements of all time.”

Erin rolled her eyes. “That’s not an achievement.”

“Someone should award me a Niels Bohr Medal.”

“Niels Bohr Medals aren’t for personal achievements. They’re for significant contributions to physics.”

“Is that so?” Holtz swivelled back and forth in her chair. “By the way, have you checked the mail recently?”

Erin eyed her suspiciously.

“Also, if any of your mail looks like it was opened already, it was probably a ghost.” Holtz twirled her finger in the air.

Erin looked like she was about to say something but decided against it. “I’ve played hooky before,” she said.

“Still on that, huh?”

“I _have!”_

“You know that popping out to get a coffee isn’t the same thing as playing hooky, right?”

“Holtzmann, I’ve played hooky.”

“You’ve skipped out of work without telling anyone where you’re going, and not come back for the rest of the day? Before yesterday?”

“Yes,” Erin said stiffly.

“Sure you have, kid.”

“I’m a decade older than you.”

“You told me to stop calling you baby,” Holtz said with another wink.

Erin didn’t have a response for that, apparently.

Holtz popped out of her chair and ambled around their desks, pausing just by Erin. “You know, I haven’t _officially_ thought about skydiving yet. It hasn’t, in a strict matter of speaking, crossed my mind as something I want to do. But once it does—”

“You’ll do it.”

Holtz leaned on the edge of Erin’s desk. “And I’m just spitballing here, contemplating out loud, to nobody, really—pondering if there are any adrenaline junkies I might know who haven’t had a chance to shoot a ghost in the face for —” She tapped on her chin— “say, 16 days, now, and might get a kick out of jumping out of a plane, maybe to celebrate, oh, I don’t know—” She lowered a gaze over her glasses— “their _significant contributions to physics?_ ”

Erin smiled.

-

“You’ve really never done this before?”

“Shocking, right?” Holtz hooked her thumbs in the straps of her parachute harness. “Seems right up my alley, doesn’t it?” Then, because she learned her lesson with the fishing escapade, she added, “Have you?”

Erin shrugged, a coy smile playing at her lips.

Holtz planted her hands on her hips with a delighted laugh. “Erin Gilbert. _You_ are a marvel.”

“A marvel?” Erin repeated dryly. “Hardly.”

“Oh, you’re something an archaeologist would write home about. That’s for sure.”

“I’m not some artefact,” Erin said.

“Really?” Holtz tilted her head. “Because I’d say you’ve been sitting around, waiting for someone to uncover you.”

-

They jumped.

“I’m falling for you,” Holtz shouted into the wind.

“What?” Erin shouted back.

-

“The windswept look is good on you,” Abby said as they passed.

Erin touched her hand to her hair and cleared her throat. “Holtz is rubbing off on me.” And, before anyone could so much as open their mouths, “No innuendos, please.”

Holtz leaned against the wall with a grin.

_4) Go skydiving_

-

It was raining, dreary and miserable. Erin kept sighing. Like, a disproportionate amount.

“Can you cut that out?” Patty asked, nose in a book. “I’m trying to read.”

“Sorry,” Erin murmured. She looked over her shoulder. “How much longer do I have to hold this?”

Holtz was digging through the shelves by the containment unit, trying to find something that she wasn’t entirely sure actually existed in her possession. “Ten, twenty minutes tops.”

“ _Holtz_.”

“You’re doing great, sweetie,” Holtz said distractedly.

“What would happen if I let go?”

Holtz froze and spun around, her lab coat whooshing around her legs. “Under _no_ circumstances can that happen.” She strode closer to inspect the button that Erin was holding down, making sure she still had full contact.

“What would happen?” Erin pressed.

“Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.”

Patty looked up.

Erin studied her, long and hard. “No. You can’t convince me that I’m staring down the barrel of total protonic reversal over a _button_. I don’t buy it.”

A pause, and Holtz broke out in a grin. “You caught me. That button does nothing. I just wanted you standing here as eye candy while I worked.”

“ _Holtzmann_.” Erin dropped her hands with a huff.

“Wow, you sure let go of that awfully fast,” Holtz said. “What if I’d been messing with you?”

Erin rolled her eyes and walked away. Holtz watched her trundle up the stairs to the second floor.

“Wuh woh,” Holtz said.

“You gotta stop doing that,” Patty said, turning back to her book. “You’re gonna break her one day.”

“I haven’t broken her yet,” Holtz said. “She’s more resilient than she appears.”

“I said _one day._ ”

-

When Holtz returned to the second floor twenty minutes later, Erin was seated at her desk, hunched over her phone.

“Texting at work, Dr. Gilbert?” Holtz said with a scandalous tone, hand over her heart in disbelief.

“Do you want to go catch a movie?” Erin asked.

Holtz blinked. “Right now?”

“It’s been miserable outside all morning, and I’m not getting any work done.” Erin waved at the nearest window, the rain pounding at it.

Holtz’s eyes lit up. “Do I get to play hooky with Erin Gilbert _twice in one week?_ ”

“If you’re lucky.”

Holtz hung off the back of Erin’s chair, leaning over her shoulder to scroll through the showtimes open on her phone. “What’s playing?”

Erin swatted her hand away and scrolled to the top. She read them out loud as she swiped down the list.

“I don’t know how to choose,” she said. “They all sound good.”

Holtz straightened up, a slow smile spreading on her face. Erin caught sight of it and looked up at her with a furrowed brow.

“I’m starting to recognize that look in your eyes,” she said apprehensively.

Holtz’s grin widened.

-

“Where are you two headed?”

“The movies,” Erin said as they tumbled out the front door one after the other.

“Which one?” Abby called at their backs.

“Yes,” Holtz called back, and slammed the door happily behind them.

-

They were seated in the center seats, two thirds of the way to the back of the theater. Acoustics was neither of their fields of study so far as physics went, but they weren’t fools.

“This was a fantastic idea,” Holtz said. Her boots were propped on the unoccupied seat in front of her, her ankles crossed. “I can’t believe I’ve never done this. A double feature? Sure, easy, hundreds of times. But a _quadruple_ feature? Never.”

Erin hummed.

Holtz glanced sideways at her. “Of course, it would be funner if a certain someone abided by traditional multi-feature rules.”

“At least _one_ of us needs to pay for admission.”

“And I did,” Holtz agreed.

“For the first one.”

“That’s enough.”

“Movie theaters have to make money somehow, Holtz.”

“Fun fact: the $20 buckets of popcorn?” Holtz patted the side of the one in her lap. “They’re for more than just ‘accidentally’ brushing your fingers against mine.” She pulled said buttery fingers out of the bucket to do the air quotes.

Even in the dim light, Erin’s cheeks lit up red.

“If you didn’t want to share your popcorn—”

“Don’t you put words in my mouth,” Holtz said with a grin. “I said nothing of the sort. I was _merely_ reminding you that movie theaters do just fine, thank you very much.”

Erin sunk down in her seat. “Box office sales are important.”

“Eriiiin,” Holtz singsonged. “We’ve got one movie left after this one. Are you _really_ going to walk back out there again to buy another ticket? Again? Really?”

“Yes.”

“Live a liiittle.”

“I have nothing to prove to you. I’ve done the traditional thing before too, you know.”

Holtz eyed her. “Really?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve snuck into a movie without paying.”

“Yes.”

Holtz waved her hand dismissively. “I don’t buy it.”

Erin caught her wrist mid-air, twining her own greasy fingers around it, and twisted in her seat to face her. “The movie theater in my hometown used to do all-day showings of classic movies every Sunday. Theater Four. I went every week.” Her voice was a little breathless. “It was an escape for me. I hid in the back of that theater the whole day. Every week. And I…didn’t have a lot of money. I only ever paid for one ticket. Sometimes I snuck in without paying at all.” She ducked her head. “There was this one guy who cleaned the theater. Jefferey. He always knew I was there, but he never kicked me out. For a while, he was kind of my only friend.”

Holtz was studying her, one corner of her mouth hooked up. “So what you’re saying is this isn’t a first for you either?” At Erin’s confused look, she gestured around, her wrist still in her grasp. “The quadruple feature. You’re an old pro.”

“Oh. Yeah. Four isn’t my record, either.” Erin gave a meek smile and finally released her wrist.

“Fascinating. Thanks for getting butter on my wrist, by the way.”

“Oh, sor—”

Holtz licked all the way around the circumference of her wrist.

Erin stared.

“You have _got_ to stop licking stuff,” she muttered.

Holtz picked up her extra-large drink and look the loudest pull of her Coke-and-Fanta mix possible, smirking around the straw and winking.

“And winking,” Erin mumbled as a much-quieter afterthought.

_5) Catch a quadruple feature_

-

They were on the roof.

“You have an astoundingly poor grasp of aerodynamics for an engineer.”

“You take that back.”

“All I’m saying is that I’ve seen Kevin achieve higher velocity with a crumpled-up piece of paper aimed for the garbage can.”

“You _take that back_.”

Erin crossed her arms proudly. “Look at how far mine just went.”

“You must have done this before. That’s the only reason you’re better at it than me.”

“Well, yes, I vividly remember doing this in science class in school.”

Holtz raised an eyebrow. “Throwing paper airplanes?”

“Throwing paper airplanes off the roof.”

“In _school?_ ” Holtz leaned against the ledge, impressed. “That doesn’t sound like school. I mean, that sounds like _my_ school…”

“Weren’t you homeschooled?”

“Yes, and I spent most of my days throwing shit off roofs. I just didn’t think that occurred in public schools, too.”

“Only when relevant to the lesson plan.”

“Ah, well there’s the difference, then.”

“We learned about aerodynamics in public school,” Erin said. “Maybe you should’ve enrolled. Learned a thing or two.”

“I learned plenty. Besides, I went to public school for kindergarten.” Holtz wound back her arm with a grin and launched her plane. It immediately got caught in a gust and spun.

“Did you learn about wind in kindergarten?”

Holtz’s grin widened. “Did you just quote X-Files at me?”

Erin’s mouth twisted.

Holtz leaned over the ledge, watching her plane spiral down. “ _Fore!”_ she yelled.

Several seconds passed, and then there was a strangled shout from the street below.

Erin quickly joined her at the ledge. “Did you just nearly poke that man’s eye out?”

“Hey, I yelled fore!”

“Oh my gosh, Holtz.” Erin leaned over, though not as far as Holtz. “Sorry, sir!” she called.

When she pulled up, Holtz had turned around and was leaning against the ledge again, gazing contemplatively at the sky.

“Oh no,” Erin said. “I know that look. Now what? What did you just get the idea to do?” Holtz could see the gears clicking in her head as she worked backwards through the conversation, looking for a clue. “Wait. Oh no.”

“ _Oh_ yes.”

-

Erin looked cute in golf attire.

That should have been a given, but Holtz was thoroughly unprepared. The little khaki capris? The muted polo with perfectly starched collar? The blindingly white tennis shoes that appeared to repel grass stains? The _visor?_

She even had a little white glove that Holtz wrongly assumed was an ode to Michael Jackson, which should have been her first clue that she was in over her head.

Holtz leaned on one of her clubs. “How many times?”

Erin was readying her tee. She had adjusted it microscopically three times now. “Hmm?”

“How many times have you been golfing in your life?”

She finally took her stance, lining up and executing four perfect practice swings, then stepped up. Her club whistled through the air pristinely, hitting the ball square on with the most satisfying noise, and it was out of there. They both watched it arc down the fairway, curving slightly to the left, which was conveniently where the green was.

“I don’t know,” Erin said.

“Bullshit.”

Erin smiled at her. “Golf is meant to be a silent sport, Holtzmann.”

“That’s probably why I’m so bad at it then, right?”

Erin shrugged. “I caddied at the country club a couple summers.”

“And you got that good just by watching?”

Erin shrugged again.

Holtz pointed her driver at her. “Don’t you shrug at me.”

Erin moved out of her way so she could take her place. Holtz jammed a tee in the grass and balanced one of her neon balls on top.

“You know, if you took your practice swings like I suggested—”

Holtz swung and hit the ball with a loud smack. It took off, careening wildly through the air. She held her hand in front of her eyes to shield the sun, but she didn’t need sight to know that it was heading right for the rough.

“Or not,” Erin said.

Holtz spun around with a grin. “What were you saying about silent sports?”

-

What Holtz _was_ good at was driving golf carts.

Erin was holding onto the roof like her life depended on it. “Slow _down_.”

Holtz cackled madly and zipped over a hill, nearly toppling them over.

-

Watching Erin line up a putt was strangely erotic.

She examined it from all angles, dropping into crouches, laying her putter on the green, mouthing silent words to herself. Holtz had no doubt that she was mapping the slope in her head, running calculations.

They were on the sixth hole. It never failed to be fascinating to watch.

Erin finally stood up and took her shot. Perfect putt, first try.

“Another eagle,” Holtz said, giving her a little round of applause.

She knew her way around plenty of golf terminology now. Sand trap. Water hazard. Bogey. Double bogey. Triple bogey. So many bogeys she probably needed to see a doctor.

“Why thank you,” Erin replied, bowing a little.

-

They only played the front nine, understandably, although Holtz could have done with nine more holes of the way Erin’s butt looked in those capris.

-

They sat across from each other at an umbrellaed table back at the club. Holtz inspected her hands. Apparently—though she had built up many layers of calluses on them over the years and considered them to be the most indestructible of any of her body parts—they were not immune to the very specific type of blisters that golf clubs gave you. She understood the glove, now. She regretted declining when Erin had offered it to her.

She flexed her fingers and looked up. Erin was watching her, her own unblistered hand wrapped around a beer bottle. She averted her gaze quickly and took a swig.

Pleased, Holtz grabbed her own beer and kicked back in her chair, propping her feet up on the table.

Erin shook her head. “I can’t believe you haven’t managed to get us kicked out yet.”

“I can’t believe they let me in to begin with.” Holtz looked down at her own borderline choice of golf attire, then back up with a grin.

Erin hid her smile behind her beer.

-

_6) Throw paper airplanes off the roof_

_7) Go golfing_

-

“So, it’s been a few weeks,” Erin said casually.

Holtz was zoned out staring into space, half asleep. She let her eyes come back into focus and turned her head. “Hm?”

Erin frowned as she took her in. “You look tired.”

“You blame me?”

After a long stint of blissful, albeit boring, radio silence on the ghost call front—a record 24 days—it now seemed like every ghost, ghoul, and nasty spookie in the tri-state area had decided to come out and party at the same time. It had been relentless for weeks. Holtz didn’t go home much anymore.

Erin pressed her lips together. “You should sleep. Why don’t you take the rest of the day off? Go home?”

Holtz ignored her and stifled a yawn. “What’s been a few weeks? The last time I took a nap?”

“Huh?”

“You said ‘it’s been a few weeks.’ What has? This parade of paranormal fuckery?”

Erin waved her off. “Never mind. It’s nothing. Hey, do you want to go to my place?”

Holtz was not so sleep-deprived that she didn’t quirk an eyebrow at that.

“Not—I just meant—your place is further away than mine is. If you need somewhere to crash, I can give you a key and you can go take a nap.”

“I didn’t expect to get a key to your apartment this soon into our relationship,” Holtz quipped, too mumbled to be effective. Her eyes were drifting shut.

Erin huffed. “Just—whatever. The offer is there. Take it or leave it.”

“I’ll go if you tell me.”

“Tell you what?”

“What’s been a few weeks.”

A pause. Holtz cracked an eye open.

“Just…the…Mop Log,” Erin admitted in barely more than a mumble herself. “That’s all.”

Holtz cracked her other eye open and looked behind her at the Log, which had not, in fact, gotten any longer in weeks. “Huh,” she said. “So it has.”

She stared at it for several moments, then turned back and held out her hand, palm up.

“Key please.”

Erin frowned again. “This…may have actually been a bad idea.”

Holtz wiggled her fingers.

Erin sighed and grabbed her key ring. “Don’t make me regret this.” She hesitated. “This isn’t going to go on the Mop Log, is it?”

Holtz shook her head fast enough that it made her dizzy. Eating wasn’t something she’d been doing tons of either. “Wouldn’t count. I’ve been to your apartment before, Gilbs.”

“Not—what? No. You haven’t.”

“Okay,” Holtz said, making a little face to herself.

Erin stretched forward across their desks to drop the key into her palm. “Don’t make me regret it,” she repeated.

-

Holtz was tired, but not tired enough to not be nosy.

She poked around, nothing intrusive. Counting the number of forks in the cutlery drawer (six). Working out how the bookshelf was organized (not just alphabetically—alphabetically by last name, by genre, and the genres were alphabetized too). Taking note which mugs were closest to the front and therefore used the most (a nerdy novelty mug from Patty; a hand-thrown blue number; a mug stolen from the firehouse that at one point belonged to Holtz). Thumbing various surfaces, increasingly harder to reach, to see if she could find any dust (no). Opening all the cupboards in the kitchen to see if she owned every small appliance known to man (yes). Counting how many tweed suits hung in her closet (nine, ordered by shade of beige).

She did not turn on her TV to see what she had DVRed. Did not touch the bathroom with a ten-foot pole. Did not open her fridge.

Finally, she passed out face-down on her immaculately made bed.

-

She woke up to knocking.

“Holtzmann? You took my only key.”

She peeled herself up off the bed, did a little reenergized shimmy in place, and skipped out of the bedroom.

Erin was still knocking when she unlocked and swung the front door open.

“Sorry,” Erin said, face colouring. “I thought you’d be out cold. I didn’t know if you’d be able to hear me.”

“Oh, I heard you, alright.”

Erin stepped inside and looked around like she expected everything to be a disaster. “Did you sleep?”

“Like a baby.”

“Good,” Erin said, still craning her head. She wouldn’t find anything. Holtz left no tracks.

“Did you come back here just to check on me?”

“No?” Erin gave her a weird look. “It’s after five o’clock. I live here.”

“Is it really?” Holtz checked her watch. “Time flies when you’re unconscious.”

“Did you really sleep this whole time? You’re not going to sleep at all tonight now.”

“Nope,” Holtz agreed cheerfully. “Just in time to head back to the lab. Give you a chance to go sniff your sheets to see if they smell like me, or whatever.”

“You slept in my _bed?_ ”

“Uh, yeah, did you expect me to nap on the couch like a common mongrel?”

“I thought that was _implied_.”

“Mmmmmmmmmmnope.” Holtz flashed her a perfect grin.

“God. I can’t believe you slept in my bed.”

“Sleeping in Erin Gilbert’s bed. Now _that_ could go on the Mop Log.” She contemplated for a second, tapping her chin rhythmically. “Mmm, no, better save that one for a later date.”

Erin flushed scarlet.

“By the way,” Holtz said, “I wholeheartedly agree that it’s been too long since we updated the Mop Log. We should remedy that. Got any ideas?”

“Ideas? Um. No. No, I—no. I don’t know. I don’t know what you have and haven’t done before.”

“So? Give it a crack.” Holtz mimed swinging a baseball bat.

“I…don’t know. Uh. A…zoo?”

“A _zoo?”_

“Yeah, I—I don’t know, have you been to a zoo?”

“Have I _been to a zoo?_ Uh, yeah, Gilbert, I know my way around a zoo.”

Erin chest turned red again. “See? Why would you ask me?”

“Have _you_ been to a zoo?” Holtz asked with mirth.

“Of course I’ve been to a zoo.”

Holtz chuckled. “Never change.”

“I told you I’d be bad at this.”

“You had some great ideas before,” Holtz reminded her. “I’ll let you sleep on it.” She saluted and stepped for the door.

Erin cleared her throat. “My key, please?”

“Oh, right.” Holtz dug it out of her pocket, then looked at it for a second, synapses firing.

“Oh no…”

She looked up slowly. “You know what I _haven’t_ done before?”

“What?” Erin asked warily.

“Broken into a zoo after hours.” Holtz flipped her the key.

Erin fumbled and missed and it fell to the floor with a clatter. “What? No! _Absolutely not_. No! _No_ , Holtz! You can’t—that’s _illegal_. _No_.”

Holtz grinned ear to ear.

“No, _no_ , no.”

“Well,” Holtz said, stretching her arms overhead. “ _I_ am going to go home. Maybe I’ll see you later, perhaps at…the Bronx Zoo, under the cover of nightfall? Say, 11:00pm?”

“ _No, Holtzmann._ ”

“That’s alright, no biggie, you can stay here.” Holtz started for the door again. “You can be here, and I can be there.”

Erin didn’t say anything.

“That’s your prerogative,” Holtz said, and paused with her hand on the door handle. “But the way I see it, you might have a moral obligation to come keep an eye on me so I don’t steal a penguin.”

“You wouldn’t steal a—”

Holtz looked back over her shoulder, lips curling.

“Damn it,” Erin said very quietly.

Holtz waited.

“Better make it midnight,” Erin grumbled.

Holtz lit up.

-

“You’re dressed like a burglar.”

“You’re not.”

“I’m trying not to draw suspicion,” Erin said with a sigh.

“I did get a lot of Suspicious Subway Stares on the way here.”

“Well yeah, you’re dressed like a burglar.”

“I think it was actually because I agreed to hold this lady’s ferret while she looked for something in her purse.”

“On the _train?”_

Holtz hummed and sized up the fence they were standing in front of. “Alright, let’s do this. I’ll boost you up.” She dropped to one knee and patted her thigh.

Erin completely disregarded her and rolled her eyes. “I know how to scale a fence, Holtzmann,” she said, and then she stepped around her and did just that.

Holtz watched her with amazement, still kneeling. “Wow. Spider Monkey Gilbert.”

Erin landed on the other side of the fence with a thud and dusted off her hands. “You coming?”

-

The zoo was quiet and dark.

It wasn’t very exciting. The animals, if not locked up for the night, were asleep. But the point wasn’t really to see the animals, it was just the mere act of coming.

So they wandered.

-

They were near Tiger Mountain when they heard the shout.

Holtz grabbed Erin’s hand and tugged her, and they ran.

They cut across the path, rounded the corner, leapt over a low wall, and ducked into some shrubbery. Heavy footsteps followed behind them, the beam of a flashlight sweeping through the dark.

“I know you’re there,” the security guard called.

Their eyes met in the bushes. Holtz pressed her finger against Erin’s lips.

“Come on, show yourself,” the guard continued. “You can’t hide.”

Before Holtz could do anything, Erin had popped up out of the hedge. She tugged on her pant leg and hissed. Erin ignored her.

“Hello!” she called, waving madly.

The man rounded the corner, and could see Holtz still crouched in the bushes. She cleared her throat and stood up as well to join Erin, the little traitor.

“My name is Dr. Erin Gilbert, and this is my colleague, Dr. Jillian Holtzmann,” Erin said brightly.

Holtz elbowed her in the ribs.

“We’re part of the Ghostbusters,” Erin continued. “We got a call?”

“A call?” The man’s eyes narrowed.

“Yes, something about a spectral bison?” Erin glanced at Holtz. “We came right away. I mean, we’ve dealt with paranormal animals before, and we know first-hand how dangerous it can get—I don’t think any of us want an animal that large roaming the streets, you know?”

The man planted his hands on his hips, fingers dangerously close to his walkie. “You’re tellin’ me there’s some sort of ghost bison out here?”

“That’s what we were told,” Erin said.

The man eyed Holtz. “Why were you hidin’ out in the bushes, then?”

“Thought I saw something,” Holtz said.

“The bison?”

“Footprints,” Holtz clarified. “Ghosts leave behind very distinctive footprints, if you know what you’re looking for. Ionization. Some ectoplasm if you’re lucky.” She sniffed the air. “It’s definitely been here.”

The man scratched his head. “Who’d you say called you?”

“Jim,” Erin said without missing a beat.

The man’s brow furrowed for several seconds, then his face smoothed out. “Oh. Sorry—he didn’t tell me you were comin’. I wouldn’t have…”

“It was pretty rushed,” Erin assured him. “Like I said, we came as fast as we could.”

“Jim let you in, then?”

“Yup,” Holtz said.

“Alright. Sorry for botherin’ you. I’ll…let you get back to it?”

“Holler at us if you see anything,” Holtz said warmly.

“You got it. And if you need anything, let me know.”

They waited until the guard had ambled away before turning to each other.

“Well, that was officially the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen you do,” Holtz said. “Way to pull that out of your ass, Gilbert.”

Erin gave her a very pointed look. “I’ve been rehearsing that since you dragged me into this mess. You can’t go breaking into places after hours without an excuse at the ready should you get caught.”

“Still, though. Ghost bison?” Holtz kissed her fingers. “Genius. And that was some luck with guessing _Jim_.”

“Luck?” Erin scoffed. “I did my research.”

“That’s hot.”

Erin rolled her eyes.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’ve done this before, too,” Holtz said.

Erin didn’t say anything, but her mouth ticked.

“Oh my _god_ ,” Holtz said, far too loudly.

“It’s possible that Abby and I staked out a possibly-haunted zoo back in Michigan one night when we were younger. And that nobody knew we were there.”

“Aaannnd?”

“No ghost,” Erin said. “We saw some giraffes, though.”

Holtz studied her in the moonlight, long enough that Erin began to twitch under her scrutinous gaze.

“What are you looking at me like that for?”

Holtz smiled.

“Science,” she said.

_8) Break into a zoo after dark_


	2. Chapter 2

“Oh my _god_ , Erin Gilbert, I just lost all respect for you.”

“What?” Erin squeaked with a nervous laugh. “Oh come on. It’s better than anything you’ve suggested.”

They were sitting side-by-side on the back of the third-floor couch, feet dangling, chopsticks buried in their respective takeout containers, trading Mop Log ideas.

“You did _not_ just suggest that.”

“What’s wrong with the Statue of Liberty?”

Holtz reached to nab some chow mein out of Erin’s container with her chopsticks. Erin batted them away.

“ _Everything_ is wrong with the Statue of Liberty,” Holtz said, shoving the noodles in her mouth.

“Hey, I _like_ the Statue of Liberty.”

Holtz’s mouth fell open, and some noodles fell out. Erin made a face at her.

“No you _don’t_.”

“Yeah, I do! It’s fun. Have you even been?”

“Of _course_ not.”

“How could you have never been to the Statue of Liberty? Haven’t you lived here even longer than I have?”

“Yeah, exactly!”

Erin shook her head and took a bite of food. “I don’t understand how you could say you hate it when you’ve never been.”

“Okay. Alright. Before you moved here, had you ever been to New York?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Why of course?”

“Well, even if I hadn’t come as a kid, I obviously came to check it out before deciding to move here.”

Holtz made a pfft noise.

“What, you _didn’t?_ ” Erin asked. “You just up and moved here without having ever been?”

“You act like that’s not normal.”

“I just…can’t imagine doing that.” Erin paused, poking around in her container with her chopsticks. “Where are you from originally, anyway? I don’t think I’ve ever asked.”

“Canada,” Holtz deadpanned.

Erin rolled her eyes. “Alright.”

Holtz pointed her chopsticks at her. “Okay, so, riddle me this: when you went to the Statue of Liberty, was it as a tourist?”

“Yes, but—”

“ _See?_ Fine for tourists. Not fine for residents.”

“I’ve gone as a resident, too.”

Holtz eyed her. “And when you went as a resident, was it with an out-of-town guest in tow?”

“No,” Erin said smugly. “I went all by myself.”

“Don’t say that like you’re proud.”

“It’s _fun_ ,” Erin said.

“It’s a _statue_ , Erin. A statue filled with people wearing foam crowns.”

“That’s not—you’ve never _been_.”

Holtz shrugged. “And I’m never gonna. Next suggestion.”

“Uh, no, you have to do it now. That’s how this works. You’ve thought about it, and now you have to do it.”

“Okay, first of all, that is _not_ how this works. The officially sanctioned rules of the Mop Log dictate that when I _want_ to do something, I do it. I don’t want to do this. _Secondly_ , I’m not going to the fucking Statue of Liberty.”

“What if I dare you?” Erin asked, voice challenging. “Then you have to do it.”

“You _dare_ me?”

“I dare you. I think the officially sanctioned Mop Log rules need an addendum that states that you have to do anything that you’re dared to do.”

Holtz raised her eyebrows. “You really want to add an addendum about dares to the Mop Log credo? Because things could get real interesting _real_ fast.”

Erin flushed. “It’s your Mop Log, not mine.”

“Are you following any of this?” Abby asked under her breath.

Patty shook her head beside her at the small kitchen table. “It’s like they’ve forgotten that we’re sitting right here.”

Holtz ignored both of them and hopped off the couch, stepping in front of Erin. “You dare me?”

“I dare you,” Erin said.

Holtz’s mouth quirked. “Come on, then.”

Erin’s eyes lit up. “Really?”

“I have one condition,” Holtz said, very seriously. “We must wear the foam crowns.”

_9) Visit the Statue of Liberty_

-

Holtz reached her desk and let her arms open, the dozens of small glass bottles she was carrying clattering down.

Erin looked up from her work and peered over the mountains of crap on Holtz’s desk to see what she’d dropped. “Is that nail polish?”

“I had a sudden hankering to paint my nails.”

“Have you ever painted your nails before?”

“Not a once,” Holtz said cheerfully. She took a seat and rummaged through the bottles, holding them up to the light curiously.

“Mop Log?”

“Mop Log.”

“Is there a stipulation that you must paint your own nails?”

Holtz thought for a second. “No.”

Erin wheeled her chair over. “I’ll do them for you.”

“Aren’t you sweet,” Holtz said in a southern drawl.

Erin picked up one of the bottles and inspected it. “These are really high quality.”

“Borrowed them from Patty.”

“Does she know?”

“Ehhh.”

Erin set the bottle back down. “Which one do you want?”

“All of them.”

“ _All?_ Holtz, there’s more colours than you have fingers.”

“I’ve got toes, too,” Holtz said. “Not ten of them, mind you.”

Erin gave her a look.

Holtz wiggled her fingers at her. “Get creative.”

Erin harrumphed, but set to work.

-

“Once again, Patty is going to kill you,” Erin said.

Holtz didn’t look up from carefully painting. The tiny brush was great for the kind of calligraphy that Sharpie wasn’t cut out for.

She screwed the brush back into the bottle and sat down, admiring first her handiwork and then Erin’s. Her nails were a mess, but a very precisely executed mess. Erin had steady hands.

_10) Paint my nails_

-

Holtz had her bare feet up on her desk as she stripped wires. Erin kept pointing out how unsafe and unsanitary that was.

“My feetsies need to breathe every once in a while,” Holtz whined. “It’s warm in here.”

“You’ve already lost one toe in your life,” Erin reminded her. “Maybe let’s not shoot for another?”

“Are you threatening me?”

“Safety first, Holtzmann.”

-

Holtz came in the next day with steel-toed crocs.

-

Holtz’s desk was piled high with skeins of yarn.

Erin stopped halfway to her own desk as she took it all in. “Uh…”

Holtz looked up excitedly. “Good morning.”

“What is, uh…that’s…a lot of…”

“I’m learning how to knit!”

“What, a sweater for Jack?”

Holtz tilted her head.

“And…the beanstalk?” Erin said. “The giant? That…was supposed to be a clever joke about how _much yarn you have, oh my god Holtzmann_. That’s _so much yarn_.”

“Frankenstein isn’t the monster,” Holtz deadpanned.

Erin faltered. “Huh?”

“And Jack…”

A beat, and Erin smacked her palm to her forehead. “Isn’t the giant. Damn it, Erin.”

Holtz grinned. “It’s early.”

Erin put away her purse and unlocked her notebook and pencils, shaking her head. “I’m going to go get some coffee. And then, when I get back, I’m going to teach you how to knit.”

“I’m doing just fine!”

“I can see from here how tangled your yarn is. What _is_ it with you and string?”

“Theory? I’m great with string theory.”

Erin rolled her eyes and left.

When she got back, two mugs of coffee in hand, she deposited one onto Holtz’s desk and held the other close to her chest as she bent over Holtz’s shoulder to inspect her knitting project. Some of her hair brushed against Holtz’s cheek. She smelled like nothing but coffee, and maybe a little bit of sweat. Holtz was into it.

“What did you…knit?”

“A mess,” Holtz said confidently.

“I can see that, yeah. What were you _trying_ to knit?”

“A…long mess?”

“A scarf?”

“Is that what you call scarves?” Holtz asked with amusement.

Erin set her coffee mug down and retreated. Holtz picked up the mug and took a gulp.

“Hey, I brought you your own,” Erin complained as she wheeled her chair over.

“I don’t trust that it’s not spiked.”

Erin took a seat beside her. “With what?”

“190-proof Everclear? Ectoplasm?” Holtz wiggled her shoulders. “Spit?”

“There’s spit in mine,” Erin pointed out, grabbing the mug out of her hand.

“You don’t strike me as someone who backwashes.”

“ _I’m_ not. _You_ are.”

“I’ll take that one, then. You take the untouched one.”

Erin glanced at the other one. “I don’t like that mug as much as this one,” she mumbled. “I chose this one on purpose.”

It was another one from Holtz’s collection. A beaten-up garage sale find with a panel of a Garfield comic on it. The one on the desk wasn’t as exciting—a museum giftshop purchase, probably Patty’s.

“Have it your way,” Holtz said. “I’ll take the boring mug, and you can have the spitty one.”

Erin’s cheeks were lightly flushed as she took another sip. Holtz waited until her mouth was full before adding:

“You know, there’s another method to spit-swapping that I prefer, but this works too.”

Erin choked a little.

Holtz grabbed the other mug and chugged back some of the steaming coffee, mouth twisting around the rim.

“So, knitting,” Erin said, a little loudly, setting down her mug. “What brought this on?”

Holtz shrugged. “How do any of the finest ideas come about?”

“I have no idea. I’ve yet to figure out how your brain works.”

“Stop trying,” Holtz suggested.

Erin reached out to poke the resolute mess tangled around the knitting needles in Holtz’s hand. “Did you watch a Youtube video, or something? Google instructions?”

Holtz scoffed.

“So you’ve just been moving yarn around on your needles in your best approximation of knitting.”

“I’m doing what feels natural.”

“ _This_ isn’t natural. This is an abomination. Get it off of there. We’re starting from scratch.”

Holtz dumped the yarn off her needles. It came off surprisingly easy. 

“Okay, first you need to learn how to cast on.” Erin looked around the desk, tongue poking out between her teeth. “I need something to demonstrate on—hmm—” She tugged open the top drawer of Holtz’s desk and began rooting through it.

“Please, go through my things.”

“I’m looking for—aha.” Erin emerged triumphant with an unopened packet of chopsticks. “These will—”

Meanwhile, Holtz had tied her yarn around the tip of one of her needles and had drawn her arm back, making a perfect _tssss ploop_ noise.

“I said cast _on_ ,” Erin said. “Smartass.”

Holtz grinned. “I’m just demonstrating that I learned something from our fishing adventure. You taught me well.” She pretended to reel in her makeshift fishing rod.

Erin unwrapped the chopsticks and plucked one of the other skeins off Holtz’s desk. “Where did you even _get_ this much yarn?” she muttered.

“Remember that bust we did at that knitting shop a few months ago?” At Erin’s nod, she leaned back in her chair. “Owner gave us her card, said to phone if we ever had a knitting emergency.”

“So she donated this all to you?”

“I paid for most of it,” Holtz said. “Couldn’t take advantage of Darlene like that. How else is she supposed to keep her business afloat?”

“Knitting is a very popular hobby, Holtzmann.”

Holtz eyed the way Erin was deftly maneuvering her yarn and chopsticks. “Yeah?”

Erin wet her lips and shrank a little under her gaze. “My grandmother taught me when I was young.”

“Grandmothers are great.”

“Grandmothers _are_ great.” Erin sighed wistfully.

“Yours still kicking?”

“What? Oh. Yes. She’s still alive and well. I just haven’t seen her in a while. I miss her.” Erin gave her a small, weak smile.

“You should go visit her.”

“I should,” Erin agreed. “I will.”

“Right now.”

“Right n—Holtz, she lives in Michigan.”

“Alriiiight,” Holtz drawled. “We’ll finish knitting first, then go.”

“ _We?_ ”

“Oh yeah. I’m coming with you.”

“What? No.”

“Meet Erin’s grandmother,” Holtz said, arching her hands in the air.

“You are _not_ putting that on the Mop Log.”

“I want to meet your grandmother. Now I gotta do it. I can go without you, if you want, but I figured you might wanna join me.”

“Do you not have grandparents of your own?” Erin asked exasperatedly.

“Sure do. I got a baker’s dozen.”

“A…baker’s dozen? Of grandparents?”

Holtz held up five fingers, two on one hand and three on the other, and wiggled them.

“Oh. How’d you pick up an extra grandparent?”

“Adopted her,” Holtz said. “Well, didn’t adopt her so much as I terrorized her lab until she eventually admitted we were family.”

Erin gave her a long look. “Are you talking about Dr. Gorin?”

“I’m talking about Dr. Gorin.”

Erin laughed, a quick burst of air from her nostrils.

Holtz held up her needles. “So. Knitting?”

“Right, yes. Okay. Do you know how to do a slip knot?”

“Hmm.” Holtz bent her head back, tapping her chin with one of the needles. “Let me see. Bowline? Reef? Sheet Bend? Clove Hitch? Half Windsor? Shoelace? No, sorry, no slip knot.”

“Do you really know all those knots?”

“Absolutely _knot_ ,” Holtz said with a wink. “We should learn them after this. Unless you already have?”

Erin shrugged. “My father used to take us sailing, too.” She folded her yarn over itself in her hands. “This is what you’re looking for.”

Holtz modeled the slip knot and, at Erin’s demonstration, tightened it around one of her needles. Then she copied Erin as she created a series of loops around her finger and transferred them one by one to the needle. Casting on, she called it.

“Knitting is a lot of finger…ing,” Erin said, cheeks flaming red before she’d reached the end of her sentence.

“I know; I’m enjoying it.” Holtz lifted her chin at her. “Your fingers…they seem to be good at a lot of activities, Gilbert.”

Erin would not look at her. The tips of her ears looked like they could combust if so much as poked. Holtz fought the impulse to test that theory.

“Disentangling fishing line,” Holtz said. “Getting popcorn grease around people’s wrists. Folding paper airplanes. Gripping golf clubs. Scaling fences. Painting nails. Knitting. I can’t help but wonder—”

“Don’t.”

“I _can’t help_ but wonder—”

Erin couldn’t clear her throat loud enough. “ _Knitting_ ,” she said at top volume.

“—what _other_ activities—”

Still a hundred decibels, “I’m going to show you the standard knit stitch now.” 

Holtz settled back in her chair with an easy grin. Sometimes unsaid was better than said.

-

Erin damn near knit an entire sweater in an hour.

Holtz knit a mess.

-

It was a longer mess this time.

-

“It’s a little early for lunch, isn’t it?” Patty called as they passed.

“We’re not going to lunch,” Holtz said. “We’re going to visit Erin’s grandmother.”

Abby’s head snapped up so fast they could hear her neck crack. “Ruth? Wait, but isn’t she in—”

They had already slipped out the door.

-

They brought their knitting on the plane. Well, Holtz brought her knitting. Erin ditched her chopsticks for a set of real needles from home and a half-finished scarf. The stitches were perfectly uniform. The yarn was rainbow.

Holtz thumbed it. “Pretty.”

Erin glanced at her. “It was supposed to be for you.”

Holtz lit up, delighted. “For meee?”

“For your birthday.”

“I’ll pretend to be surprised.” She used one of her knitting needles to cross above her heart.

-

Erin briefly fell asleep on her shoulder, her knitting abandoned in her lap.

Holtz kept working on her own. She moved her arm as little as possible. She hummed a lullaby—a few bars of Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This). It was one of her favourites, the music video alone charting it into her top ten. It had all of her favourite things—ladies in suits, trippy transitions, blindfolds, cows.

She put down her knitting as well, and let her head lean against Erin’s, and let herself dream (of ladies in suits, trippy transitions, blindfolds, cows, Erin).

-

The house was modern. All straight lines and floor-to-ceiling windows. It wasn’t what Holtz expected. In her experience, grandparents lived in dated dwellings with shag carpeting and green toilets and shag carpeting on green toilets. Or in care homes. Or in the South End of Boston with their wives.

Erin’s grandmother opened the door.

“Hi, Grandma,” Erin said softly.

The older woman’s face lit up. “Erin? Look at you! What are you doing here?”

“Oh, I was in the neighbourhood and thought I’d swing by for a visit.”

“Stop trying to sound cavalier.” Holtz elbowed her. “What she _means_ is that we hopped on a plane on a whim to come see you.”

The woman turned an expectant gaze to her.

“Oh, yeah, right.” Holtz extended a hand. “Jillian Holtzmann, Daily Prophet. Ruth, I assume?”

Ruth shook her hand with a laugh, and then looked at Erin, eyes sparkling. “Your girlfriend?”

“My _colleague_ ,” Erin said forcefully.

Holtz winked at Ruth.

-

“Jillian, can I get you something to drink?” Ruth swept through the bright, sleek kitchen. “Tea? Scotch? Chocolate milk?”

“A woman after my own heart,” Holtz said, hand to her chest. “Chocolate milk would be _delightful_.”

“Nobody is allowed to call her that,” Erin warned Ruth. “It’s Holtzmann. Or Holtz.”

“Don’t tell your grandmother what to call me,” Holtz said cheerfully, accepting a cold glass from Ruth and taking a sip of chocolatey goodness.

“What, you’re saying she _can?_ Holtz, one time I called you the J name and you _literally_ sicced a ghost on me.”

Holtz flashed a wide smile. “I make special exceptions for grandparents.”

“I’ll call you whatever you want me to call you, dear,” Ruth said, patting her arm as she passed by.

Holtz pointed at her. “I _like_ you, Ruth. Ruthie? Can I call you Ruthie?”

“No, dear, you can call me Grandma.”

Holtz did a score motion with her hand. “My collection grows!”

Erin shook her head at her. “I should have known you’d be good at this.”

“What?”

“Charming grandparents.”

“Grandparents, babies…I charm everyone.”

“You don’t charm me.”

“Don’t I?”

Ruth was leaning against the kitchen counter, looking back and forth between them with an amused and knowing smile.

Erin caught sight of it. “We’re _not dating_.”

“Okay,” Holtz and Ruth said simultaneously.

-

The three of them were seated on the modern grey sectional knitting while an electric fireplace crackled artificially in the background.

Ruth kept correcting her technique, helping her pick up dropped stitches, all the while keeping up an endless stream of conversation about anything and everything. She didn’t ask Holtz any personal questions, but she did engage in a twenty-minute discussion with her about different methods of potato chip production and what her preferences were, which, in Holtz’s opinion, was a far more effective way of getting to know someone.

Erin didn’t join in the conversation much as it flowed from one topic to another, but Holtz did catch her smiling to herself every now and then as she quietly continued knitting the rainbow scarf.

-

Later, Holtz wandered the house to give Erin some alone time with Ruth. She was also on the hunt for embarrassing childhood photos, but it appeared that Erin got her decorating sensibilities from her grandmother, because the only thing lining the walls were simple art pieces. Until—aha. It was nearly hidden, tucked behind a potted plant on a little table crammed in the corner at the end of the hallway.

Baby Erin looked shockingly similar to Adult Erin. She was maybe ten in the photo. Blunt bangs, blue eyes, some sort of itchy-looking matching outfit. Her long arms were wrapped around her grandmother, leaning into her side.

Holtz snuck a quick photo of it on her phone. For science.

She turned back around. Erin was standing at the other end of the hallway.

“I saw that.”

Holtz pocketed her phone. “You saw nothing.”

Neither of them said anything as Holtz approached her.

She studied her face when she got there, then licked her lips. “She believed you?”

Erin tilted her head in confusion.

“About the ghost,” Holtz added.

Erin bit her lip and nodded. “She did,” she whispered.

Holtz smiled and squeezed her arm.

-

When they were set to leave, Ruth held Holtz an arm’s length away and gave her a very particular look.

“I’m workin’ on it,” Holtz promised her.

“Try harder,” Ruth said, pulling her into a hug. “I mean, come on, Holtz,” she said in her ear.

“You got it, Grandma.”

-

_11) Learn to knit_

_12) Visit Erin’s grandmother_

_13) Knit with Erin’s grandmother_

-

“Come to my place after work.”

Erin froze, her overworked pencil locked in her grasp. “What? I—what? Why would—what?”

Holtz stared at her, unblinking.

Erin cleared her throat a bunch, as she often did. “I don’t—why—um, I—”

“I want to make pie,” Holtz said. “And I have a hunch that you know how to do that.”

Erin slumped down with minor relief colouring her features. “Oh. I—yes. I know how to make pie.” She cleared her throat another several times for good measure, tugging on her collar. “What kind of pie?”

“All the pies.”

“All…the pies?”

“All the pies,” Holtz confirmed. “Well, not the savouries. Mince meat. Chicken pot. Shepherd’s. No thanks.”

“Shepherd’s pie isn’t pie.”

“Say what now?”

“Have you not—oh, never mind. Is your kitchen, um—”

“Up to Erin Gilbert standards?”

“—suitable for baking…all the pies?”

Holtz shrugged. “There aren’t rats.”

“Do you have ingredients?” Erin pressed.

“Erin,” Holtz said very seriously. “I’ve never cooked or baked a damn thing in my life. I own nothing.”

“Okay, well, we’ll have to go grocery shopping, then. Maybe it’s…a little overambitious to bake all the pies? Maybe we just choose one pie?”

“All the pies,” Holtz said firmly.

“Do you have a list?”

“I don’t do lists.”

“An…idea of which pies specifically you want to do, then?”

“All of them.”

Erin sighed. “Alright. We’d better leave now, then, or we’ll be up until midnight.”

-

Holtz paused outside her apartment door, fumbling for her keys. Her arms were full of bags. So were Erin’s.

She looked over her shoulder at her. “You scared?”

Erin eyed the door warily, shifting one of the bags that was slipping from her grasp. “Yes,” she admitted. “Should I be?”

“Depends on what you think is waiting for you on the other side of this door,” Holtz said, and turned the key in the lock.

She burst into the apartment, conscious of Erin following behind her, and beelined for the kitchen, where she dumped the half dozen bags onto the counter. She gave her arms a little shake before turning around.

Erin was standing just inside the door, arms still full, looking bewildered as she glanced around. Holtz rejoined her and took the rest of the bags from her.

“Thoughts? Opinions? Judgements? Proclamations?” Holtz returned to the kitchen and added Erin’s bags to the pile. She could hear the scrabbling of tiny claws in the next room over.

“It’s…not what I expected.”

Holtz danced back over to close the door when it became apparent that Erin wasn’t going to. “What’d you expect?”

“A…mess?”

Holtz snorted. “You sound disappointed.”

“I…” Erin bit her lip. “No. Just surprised.”

“I’ll make sure to mess it up a little before you come over next time.”

Erin’s cheeks flushed, just a little.

There was a thumping noise from the other room, followed by the jingling of a bell and running paws.

Erin jumped, then bent over. “Oh, hello.”

Holtz scooped up the cat that was weaving around her shins. “Erin, Topsoil. Topsoil, Erin.”

“ _Topsoil?_ ”

Holtz kissed the top of the cat’s head. “Found him covered in dirt. Didn’t I, Tippy Top?”

Erin reached her hand out for him to sniff with a fond shake of her head.

Holtz set the cat down. “I’m gonna go check on the Warm Fuzzies before we get started.”

Erin followed her into the other room. “Do you really pay for a two-bedroom apartment so your chinchillas can have their own room?”

Holtz popped the door on the massive system of cages. “Under New York law, each resident of a dwelling is required to have a livable area of no less than 80 square feet.”

“I think occupancy laws are actually meant to apply to people, Holtzmann.”

“You try telling _them_ that.” Holtz gathered up one of the chinchillas and held it to her chest, nodding her chin at the cage. “Meet Fuzzies One through Four.”

Erin scratched the chinchilla’s head with the tip of her finger. “What are their names?”

“Those are their names.”

“What, like…Fuzzy One? Fuzzy Two?”

“Correct.”

“Can…you tell them apart?”

“Of course,” Holtz scoffed. “They’re my children, Erin.”

“Which one is this one, then?”

“Fuzzy Four,” Holtz said immediately. She bent to let her hop onto the floor. “We can let them run amok while we bake.”

“Won’t the cat get them?”

“No, they’re best friends. He sleeps on top of their cage during the day. When I let them all out, they usually end up in a big cuddle pile. You’ll see.”

-

“Jesus, Holtzmann.” Erin is standing in front of her open refrigerator. “You weren’t kidding.”

“Why would I kid?”

“I mean, I figured you were exaggerating when you said you had nothing. I didn’t think you’d _actually_ have nothing. This looks like the fridge of a sociopath, Holtz!”

“I’m told that sociopaths eat.”

“So why don’t _you?”_

“I do.” Holtz handed her a carton of eggs. “Just not here.”

“Okay, fine, but you literally have _nothing_. An empty fridge! And freezer! And cupboards! What if there was an emergency?”

“If there was an emergency, I wouldn’t be here.”

“What if you got snowed in?”

Holtz hooked her thumb over her shoulder. “I’d eat the kids.”

Erin blanched.

“ _Kidding_ ,” Holtz said. “Oh my god, I’d sooner chew off my own arm.” She gnawed on her arm a little to demonstrate.

“ _Holtz_.”

-

After the perishables were safely stowed, they stood surveying the remaining ingredients taking up the whole counter.

“What’s your favourite pie?”

“Shepherd’s,” Erin said.

Holtz grimaced.

“No, um…I don’t know. Pumpkin, I guess?”

“ _Pumpkin?_ Christ, Erin. I just lost respect for you all over again.”

“What’s wrong with pumpkin pie?”

“It’s so _mushy_. It’s basically baby food in a pie shell. Don’t fight me.”

“Okay, fine, we won’t make it.”

“We couldn’t anyway. Didn’t buy any pumpkins.”

“Uh…yeah we did?” Erin held up a can.

Holtz squinted at it. “Pumpkin comes in _cans?_ ”

“Yes? How did you think pumpkin pies were made?”

“Uh, with _pumpkins?_ ”

“It’s May, Holtz.”

“So?”

Erin just sighed and set the can down. “Never mind. No pumpkin pie.”

“ _Obviously_ we’re going to make pumpkin pie. We’re making all the pies. And it’s your favourite.”

“Oh.” Erin ducked her head. “Thank you.”

Holtz planted her hands on her hips. “So. Where do we start?”

“Well, I was thinking…I don’t think it would be a fulfilling first-time pie-making experience for you if we didn’t make at least one crust by hand.”

Holtz squinted at her. “I don’t like where this is going.”

“It’s part of the experience! Just one. That’s all. The rest we can use these.” Erin patted the towering stack of frozen pie crust boxes. They’d cleared out the entire case of them at the store.

“Alriiiiight. Might as well do this right.”

“Great,” Erin said. “We should probably start with that, then. The dough will need time to rest.”

“To _rest?_ Excuse me? Like it needs to take a nap part way through? Because I can get behind that.”

“It’s for developing the gluten.”

“Developing the—oh my god, this sounds so complicated.”

“Baking is a science,” Erin said. “You should be good at this.”

“I’m an engineer, not a chemist.”

“Use your imagination.”

-

Their dough was resting. They were standing side-by-side at the counter, peeling and coring apples with their Swiss Army knives. Holtz didn’t own kitchen knives.

Erin had flour on her cheek. She seemed sad.

“Everything okay, Gilbert?” Holtz flicked a seed from her apple with the tip of her knife.

Erin glanced at her. “What? Oh. Yeah, of course.”

Holtz swapped her finished apple for another and dug the blade under the peel.

“I just still can’t believe that this is what your apartment looks like,” Erin said quietly.

“Why?”

“It’s…not what I thought it would be like. I thought that…there would be stuff everywhere. Like your desk. And the lab. Junk piled up, burn marks everywhere, probably something radioactive…but there’s nothing here—nothing.” Erin hesitated. “It makes me feel like I don’t know you as well as I thought I did.”

Holtz shrugged. “You know me plenty.”

“Holtz, this place—it doesn’t look like anyone lives here. Especially not you.”

Holtz shrugged again. “Well, I don’t. Not really. You know that. I basically only come here to sleep, and you know how infrequently I do that. The firehouse is home.” She got another apple. “Besides, as if you can talk. You’ve seen your place, right?”

“Just because I prefer a…minimalist look, and just because my apartment is neat…that doesn’t mean that it looks like nobody lives there.”

Holtz thought about the mugs. The bookshelf. The line of tweed in the closet.

“Yeah, you’re right.”

Erin gestured around her. “This is different. _This_ is sad. This makes me sad.”

“It shouldn’t. I’m happy, Erin. I just don’t spend much time here, that’s all.”

“Don’t your pets miss you?”

“I’ve got a pet sitter that comes for a few hours every day. No mouths hungry in this household.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Erin said softly.

Holtz ran her tongue along her teeth. “Yeah,” she mumbled. “I guess they probably do miss me.”

“You should try to spend more time at home.”

“I told you, this isn’t home.” She gestured around at the bare apartment like Erin had done. “Why would I want to be _here_ when I could be at the firehouse? With…with my family, and my tools, and the ghosts, and…” She didn’t finish the sentence, realizing it was turning into a list. She didn’t do lists. 

Erin was silent for a moment. They peeled their apples quietly.

“I’ll come hang out with you,” Erin said suddenly, definitively.

Holtz looked at her with confusion.

“After work sometimes,” Erin continued. “We’ll come hang out here. We’ll—talk, or bake pies, or—or play with the Fuzzies, or do whatever you want. And you’ll be here, and I’ll be here, so you won’t be alone, and maybe it won’t feel so…” She met Holtz’s eyes. “I mean, maybe it will feel a bit more…”

She didn’t finish her sentence either, but it was okay. Holtz knew what she meant.

Because Erin was right—the apartment felt more like home with her there.

-

The kitchen was unadulterated mayhem. Holtz was rolling pie dough out with a rolling pin that had joined her kitchen arsenal tonight for the first time ever, along with cutting boards, a dozen mixing bowls (which still wasn’t enough mixing bowls, considering they kept having to wash them), saucepans, and several assorted utensils. Erin was lamenting the fact that they hadn’t purchased an electric mixer of any kind and had threatened at least four times to go back to her own apartment and get hers.

The pies were in various stages of doneness, but none were completely done yet. Some were in the oven. Some were chilling in the fridge. Some were filled and on standby. Some fillings were still being mixed.

Holtz had music blasting through a boombox, one of the only things she had in the apartment. They’d already had the neighbours pound on the walls a few times. It was 10:00pm.

Erin held out a spatula with something on it. Holtz took a lick.

“Banana cream?”

Erin nodded. “Is it okay?”

“It’s delicious.”

“I don’t really get why you’re okay with the cream pies and the custard pies but you have such a textural issue with pumpkin. It doesn’t make sense to me.”

“I don’t have to explain myself to you.”

Erin shook her head, but was smiling.

-

“What’s still left?”

“Uh, you wanna take pecan?”

“I probably shouldn’t. I’m allergic.”

Without blinking, Holtz karate kicked the bag of pecans off the counter and sent it flying. It smacked the wall on the other side of the apartment. “Why didn’t you _say so?_ ”

“That was really not necessary,” Erin said. “I’ll only have an allergic reaction if I eat them.”

“Why the hell are we making a pecan pie, then?”

“Because you wanted to make all the pies,” Erin said. “It’s okay. Go get the nuts.”

“I will not go get the nuts.”

“Go get the nuts.”

“You’re nuts.”

“Oh, _I’m_ nuts? I’m the nuts one?” Erin grabbed the spoon sticking out of one of the mixing bowls and flicked it at her. One of the fillings splattered on Holtz’s face. Erin laughed.

Holtz licked the corner of her mouth. Pumpkin.

“Ooh, you’re going to get it.” Holtz grabbed a handful of shredded coconut and blew it out of her palm. It gusted right into Erin and fell over her like snow.

Erin gasped and giggled, sticking her hand right into another one of the bowls. Holtz ducked right as whatever it was flew past her and hit the wall behind her. She looked over her shoulder. Cherry juice dripped down the wall gruesomely.

Erin covered her mouth. “Oh my god.”

Holtz looked back at her, grinning. “Oh, Gilbert. Now you’ve done it.”

She grabbed the nearest bowl, not bothering to see which one it was. Erin squealed and tried to escape around her, but Holtz cornered her, backing her against the fridge. She dipped her hand into the bowl and appraised Erin’s face before carefully painting on a chocolate pudding moustache with the tip of her finger.

“I hate you,” Erin said.

Their faces were inches apart.

While Holtz stared at her, Erin reached between them and swiped up some chocolate pudding of her own. She dabbed it on the end of Holtz’s nose.

Holtz was breathing heavy. “Truce?”

Erin leaned in.

And licked the pudding off the end of Holtz’s nose.

“Truce,” she agreed.

“Careful,” Holtz said, “or I’ll…lick your moustache off.”

Erin smiled wryly and sidestepped around her. “I’d like to see you try.”

-

Holtz was whipping meringue. Lots of meringue. An obscene amount of meringue. Erin had slipped home just after midnight and returned with her handheld electric mixer, finally fed up. It was good they had it now—there was a lot of meringue, and egg whites were a bitch to beat by hand when all they’d done for hours was mix things.

Erin was dancing. Hips shaking, fingers wiggling.

Holtz was so enthralled watching her that she nearly overwhipped the meringue.

“Watch it,” Erin said, sidling up to her, hanging over her shoulder. She smelled like all the pies. She dipped her pinky into the meringue and held it up to examine it. “That’s good. Stiff peaks.”

Holtz hooted. “We’re ready to roll, baby.”

Erin didn’t comment on the accidental baby.

-

They sat across from each other on the floor of Holtz’s living room, surrounded by pies. It was the only place big enough to lay them all out. The Fuzzies were curled up in the corner with Topsoil. Holtz was keeping an eye on them.

There were 13 pies. They were trying all of them. Well, they each got one pass. Holtz’s was pumpkin. Erin’s was pecan.

That still left a dozen for each of them to try. They ate them right out of the tins, passing them back and forth to take forkfuls, rating them as they went.

It was after 3:00am.

“What’s your middle name?” Erin asked in the middle of trying the peach.

Holtz raised an eyebrow at her. “Why?”

“I want to get to know you better.”

“I can think of a hundred more interesting questions than that.”

“What is it? I want to know. I’ll tell you mine.”

“Is it Ruth?”

Erin paused, fork halfway to her mouth. “How did you know?”

“Lucky guess.”

“Well, I doubt I’m going to guess yours, so just tell me.”

“I’ve got three.”

“ _Three?”_ Erin shook her head. “Okay, what are they?”

Holtz took a second forkful of the peach. “You get one,” she decided.

“Only one? That’s not fair.”

“Sure it is. You can even choose which one.”

Erin thought for a moment. “The first.”

“Is it ’cause you can’t bear the thought of learning them out of order?”

“Maybe.”

Holtz had decided she was done with the peach. It was okay, but they were learning that they’d either undercooked or overcooked a lot of the fruit pies. The peach was verging on over, just a tad mushy. The rhubarb on the other hand had been near-inedible.

“It’s Susan,” she said, picking up the next in line, key lime.

“Susan?” Erin repeated. “Susan. Jillian Susan Holtzmann. Interesting.”

“Jillian Susan Hm-Hm Hm-Hm Holtzmann,” Holtz corrected.

“Is that you hinting that the other ones both have two syllables?”

Holtz’s mouth closed around a bite of key lime. “Maybe.”

Erin sat back with a satisfied expression and took the pie from her to try for herself. “Mmm, I like that one a lot.”

“One of the forerunners right now,” Holtz agreed.

“Will you ever tell me the others?”

“My other forerunners?”

“Your other middle names.”

“One day,” Holtz said, reaching for the sweet potato. “When you earn them.”

Erin looked very pointedly around her at the pies. “I’d love to know what I have to do to earn the rest of them.”

Holtz laughed.

-

They saved the most labour-intensive for last. Their prized apple, the one they’d used the homemade crust for. For this one, they cut themselves perfect slices. Plates and everything.

“It’s pretty fuckin’ great,” Holtz said, mouth full.

“It is,” Erin agreed with a grin, “pretty fucking great.”

Holtz nearly fell over with glee.

_14) Bake all the pies_

-

After the pies, there was a stretch of time where it seemed like they were adding something new to the Mop Log every day.

Their entries varied widely. Some were simple (try Moroccan food). Some required field trips (pet a sting ray). Some required a bit of persistence, and possible abuse of mayoral connections (attend a taping of Saturday Night Live). Some required the help of experts (blow glass). Some finally brought Abby and Patty into the mix (throw a Murder Mystery dinner—that one allowed Holtz to wear a fake moustache and suspenders. She loved it).

Some were easily completed in a day or less (build a house of cards) and others took a little longer, like when Holtz declared that she wanted to write and publish a book.

Erin was especially eager about that one, practically giddy, offering to help in any way she could. That was, of course, until she realized that Holtz didn’t mean a book of scientific research, but rather a picture book about a little goat who liked science and building things and was maybe a little weirder than the other goats and also pretty gay.

(It made the New York Times Best Sellers list).

(Even though she didn’t do lists).

-

Erin kept her promise, and came and hung out with her at her apartment at least once a week.

“You ready to go?” Erin slung her purse over her shoulder.

“Five more minutes,” Holtz whined.

Erin grabbed the screwdriver out of her hand. “Come on. It’s after six.”

“Alriiight.”

-

By the time they stepped out into the warm nearly-summer air, they were bickering about scented candles and what the best flavours were. Erin hated that Holtz called them flavours.

“Have you ever tasted a candle, Holtzmann?”

“Don’t tempt me.”

-

There was a package leaning against the door to Holtz’s apartment when they got there. Erin eyed it suspiciously.

Holtz bent to pick it up. “What is—oh!” She tucked it under her arm and shot Erin a grin. “I know what we’re doing tonight.”

“What is that?”

“You’ll see.” Holtz unlocked the door and ushered Erin in.

Topsoil was already right there, screaming at Erin until she picked him up.

Holtz tossed the package over to the couch and kicked off her boots. Erin’s head snapped up at the sound that it made.

“I think I know what that is,” she said.

Holtz took Topsoil from her and buried her face in his fur. “Oh yeah?”

Erin nodded confidently. “I’d know the sound of a jigsaw puzzle anywhere.”

“Is that what they sound like? Wouldn’t know—never done one.”

“You’ve never done a _puzzle_?”

“Are you _surprised?_ Can you really imagine _me_ sitting down for a _puzzle?_ ”

“They’re fun!”

“I sure hope so, because I don’t get the Mop Log entry if we don’t finish it.”

Erin rubbed her hands together. “Let’s see what you got, then.”

Holtz let Topsoil down and led Erin over to the couch to get the package. “I didn’t really know what I was looking for, so I just picked something relevant to my interests.” She tore into the package and dumped the puzzle box out. “See? It’s a rainbow! It’s gay!”

Erin stared at the box.

“I hope that’s enough pieces,” Holtz said. “I had no frame of reference. I didn’t want it to be _too_ easy.”

Erin continued to stare at the box. She looked up slowly.

“Uh, Holtz?”

“Yeah? Is it enough pieces?”

“Yeah,” Erin said weakly. “Yeah, 5,000 pieces is _enough_. Oh my god.”

“What, is that…too…many?”

“Uh…let’s just say between that and the fact that you picked a random-cut _solid colour gradient, oh my god_ , we’re going to be here forever.”

“I have no idea what any of that means. I just know that it’s gay and I liked it.”

Erin shook her head. “We’d better get to work.”

-

They were back on the floor, because once again it was the only surface expansive enough for the task at hand.

5,000 pieces, as it turned out, was a lot.

It took them the first hour just to flip all the pieces so they were right side up. Now they were sorting them by colour. Erin said it was their only hope of success.

In amongst the plethora of pieces, there was also a mostly-empty pizza box, a tub of cookie dough that they’d had delivered, and two wine glasses that were in danger of being knocked over by a Fuzzy.

Erin scooped her glass up and out of harm’s way. “You really need to stop that, Fuzzy…Three?” She looked up for confirmation.

Holtz grinned.

“Did I get it right?” Erin asked excitedly.

“Nope,” Holtz said with a happy shake of her head. “But it’s cute that you care enough to try.”

Erin blushed and took a long sip of wine.

-

They had managed to put together about two thirds of the edge pieces. It was nearly 10:00pm.

Erin kept yawning—wine made her sleepy.

Holtz was lying on her stomach, legs kicking in the air. She reached for a piece. “Look alive, Gilbert.”

“I’m sorry.” Erin yawned again. “I’m starting to get tired. I should probably go soon.”

“What about our puzzle?”

“We’re not going to finish it tonight anyway,” Erin said, grabbing their empty wine glasses. She stood up very gracefully. Holtz didn’t think it was possible to stand up from cross-legged gracefully. “I’ll come over again tomorrow, alright?”

She started to walk towards the kitchen, but Holtz caught her ankle as she walked past. She stumbled and nearly tripped.

“Hey, watch it.” She tried tugging her ankle out of Holtz’s unrelenting grasp, hopping on one foot, then surrendered and set her foot down.

“You know what I want to do?” Holtz let go of Erin’s ankle and pushed herself up into a seated position.

“What?” Erin asked warily.

“Pull an all-nighter.”

“Holtz…”

“You could really walk away and leave this unfinished?”

Erin rolled her shoulders back. “We have to work tomorrow.”

“So?”

“So…I can’t stay up all night. If you want to, go ahead.”

“Pleeeeease? We could get a double entry for the Mop Log.”

Erin scoffed at her. “You’re telling me that you’ve never pulled an all-nighter before?”

“I haaave,” Holtz said. “But not with someone else. _That’s_ the entry.”

“We basically did that when we made pies.”

“Nuh uh. You left at 4:00am and went home to sleep. All-nighters don’t count unless you don’t sleep until the following night.”

“That’s not even remotely true. You just made that up.”

Holtz shrugged. “My apartment, my rules. You in or not?”

Erin held her gaze for several seconds, then looked over the puzzle, then sighed.

“If we’re going to do this, then we’re going to need to go pick up some coffee. And more snacks.”

Holtz threw her hands in the air.

-

Erin got giggly when she was tired. Holtz knew this, of course. She’d seen it before, many times.

But there was something distinctly special about Erin, sleepy, a couple glasses of wine, slightly delirious from hours upon hours of puzzling. Holtz couldn’t stop grinning.

Erin kept trying to press puzzle pieces onto her forehead and get them to stay there. She thought it was the funniest thing in the world. It kind of was.

-

At some point, Holtz flopped onto her back. “Erin, I can’t go on.”

“No, no, don’t you _dare_ flake on me.”

Holtz swept a hand over her eyes and sighed dramatically.

A minute passed, and there was abruptly a Warm Fuzzy on her. When she moved her hand, she could see Erin stalking around the room, gathering all of them up and depositing them one by one onto her stomach.

“If you think this is the way to get me back to work, you’re horribly misguided,” Holtz said. “I’m never moving now.”

She scooped up the closest Fuzzy and cradled it against her cheek.

“Oh my god,” Erin whispered. “This is the _cutest_ thing ever.”

A few seconds later, she heard an obnoxious shutter sound. She craned her head just in time to see Erin fumble her phone away.

“I’m going to pretend you didn’t do that. Are you aware that your system sound is on? And as a follow-up question, how do you not go insane?”

Erin glanced at her pocket. “You can turn that off?”

“In the interest of not giving you the power to take sneaky photos of me whenever you like, I decline to answer.”

“That still leaves me the power to take unsneaky photos of you whenever I like.”

“Fill your boots,” Holtz said, turning her head to wink. “That just means I’ll know every time you can’t get enough of the view.”

Erin groaned. “Insufferable.”

“That’s what they call me.”

-

Holtz was no stranger to all-nighters, but she usually did them with an energy drink in one hand and a machine in the other that had the potential to zap her even harder than the drink if she poked at it wrong.

Which was to say that she was getting significantly bleary-eyed. Something about the hundreds upon hundreds of brightly-coloured pieces was really hard on her brain.

She sat back onto her heels and rubbed her eyes.

Erin looked up. “You okay?”

“I need a break,” Holtz admitted.

“Me too.” Erin stood up, joints cracking, and held out a hand. “Come here.”

Holtz grabbed it and let Erin pull her up and over to the couch, which they both collapsed into.

“You’re not allowed to fall asleep,” Erin warned.

“Neither are you.”

“I wish you had a TV. Something to keep us awake.”

“Just be glad I have a couch.” Holtz shifted, curling up against Erin’s side, half in her lap like a cat, and closed her eyes.

“Holtz…” Erin warned.

Holtz snuggled closer.

A long pause, and then a sigh, and Erin’s hand rested stiffly on her. Wrought with tension, like it would rather be anywhere else.

“Don’t fall asleep,” she said again.

“I won’t. I’m just giving my eyes a break.”

“If you don’t talk to me, I’ll fall asleep,” Erin said.

“Tinkerbell under parental censors,” Holtz mumbled.

“Huh?”

“Oh, I’m not going to explain that one. That was a good one.”

Another pause. “What’s your favourite movie?”

“That’s a boring question.”

“You always say that. What do you not consider a boring question?”

“Any question I’m willing to answer.”

“That…doesn’t answer my question.”

“That was a boring question too.”

Erin sighed again. “Fine, then, no questions.”

“Your honour.”

“Hm?”

“No further questions, _your honour_.”

“I’m not going to call you ‘your honour.’”

They fell silent.

“I said you had to keep talking or I’d fall asleep,” Erin said.

“Alright. What do you like most about the Mop Log?”

“That’s…awfully presumptive to assume that I like it.”

Holtz cracked an eye open to look up at her. “Erin. You’ve done _every single entry_ with me. ‘Do you like the Mop Log’ would be the worst, most boringest question ever.”

“That’s…fair.”

“So?” Holtz poked her, eyes settling closed again. “What do you like the most about the Mop Log?”

Erin was quiet for a brief moment. “Spending time with you.”

This time, both eyes opened. Holtz squinted into the light. “Oh really?”

“Yes.” Erin bit her lip, staring at the ceiling to avoid her. “It’s fun.”

“Innntereesssting.”

“Shut up.”

“Veeerrry innnteereestiiing.”

“I can change my answer, you know.”

“You probably should.” She closed her eyes again and snuggled in closer. “You stole it from me, anyway.”

She didn’t have to have her eyes open to see Erin’s smile.

-

After their couch interlude, they both got a second wind and set to work again.

“We’re not leaving this apartment until this puzzle is finished,” Holtz warned. “I don’t care if we don’t make it in to work tomorrow at all.”

Erin groaned, and picked up speed.

-

The sun rose.

Holtz bent her rule and let them leave the apartment. They stumbled up to the roof, laughing and delirious, to watch the sun come up.

She spent a perhaps excessive amount of time on the roof of the firehouse, testing inventions or dancing or hiding out with her thoughts or watering the small colony of ectoplasm-infused plants she was attempting to grow. She had never been onto the roof of her apartment building.

“Wow,” Erin breathed at the view, the sun creeping up behind the glittering skyline. She grabbed Holtz’s hand and squeezed.

The roof was warm, but Holtz shivered.

“Wow,” she agreed.

-

They were so close.

-

They were so close—in the home stretch. They were supposed to be at work hours ago. Erin had texted Abby to let her know they’d be late.

They moved so fast their hands blurred—though that was possibly from the exhaustion. They were so in sync that it seemed like every time one of them was looking for a specific piece, the other already had it in hand.

And then—just before 10:00am—they did it.

One last piece. A jagged-edged monstrosity. Blue.

“Count of three?” Erin suggested.

They nudged it into place together, both touching it like a Ouija board planchette.

Then they both sat back, blinking.

“Holy—”

“Shit fuck damn,” Holtz finished. “We did it Gilbert.”

Erin enthusiastically high-fived her. “We did it—oh my gosh, we did it. I didn’t think it was possible.”

Holtz drew two check marks in the air. “Done and done.”

“It was a good night for the Mop Log.”

“It was a good night, period.”

Erin bobbed her head, grinning toothily.

They sat there soaking it in for a few minutes, and then Erin stood up and stretched.

“Well, I should head back to my apartment.”

Holtz stood too. “Nuh uh. No sleeping.”

“Not to _sleep_ , to get changed. And probably shower. I feel so grimy.”

“The grime is critical to the all-nighter experience. You wash it away and you wash away the win.”

“What? No. You can’t add rules. I’m allowed to shower and change.”

“Nuh uuuuh. We’re going to work.”

“Holtzmann, I’m disgusting!”

“You couldn’t be disgusting if you tried,” Holtz said solemnly. “Work on that, why don’t you? You could stand to be a little disgusting.”

Erin rolled her eyes.

“C’mon,” Holtz said, nodding her chin at the door. “We got a lab to get to.”

Erin let out a long and exhausted groan, but followed her.

-

“Oh my gosh, you are _so wrong_. You’re so wrong that I can’t even begin to explain how wrong you are,” Erin was saying as they burst through the doors of the firehouse.

“You can’t even _begin?_ So lazy, Dr. Gilbert,” Holtz teased. “I thought you were a scientist?”

“Oh, I’m a scientist, alright. And I’m going to prove just how wrong you are. It’s _physically_ impossible, Holtz—you’d have to bend the laws of physics entirely—”

“You doubt me? Hey Abby. Hey Patty. Hey Kevin.”

“Morning everyone. I don’t _doubt_ you, Holtzmann, I know you’re wrong! There’s a difference. I’m going to go prove that you’re wrong.”

“And I’m going to prove that I’m right.”

Holtz had one foot on the stairs when someone caught her by the elbow. She stepped back down and turned to face Patty. Beside her, Abby had her arms crossed. Erin continued to run up the stairs unaware.

“Morning,” Holtz said. “I said morning, didn’t I?”

“Holtzy…” Patty glanced at Abby. “We don’t know, uh, exactly how to ask this—”

Abby butted in. “Are you—”

“Not yet,” Holtz said cheerfully.

“You didn’t let me finish my—”

“You’ll know,” Holtz said, then popped onto her toes to kiss each of them on their cheeks. “Ta ta, I’ve got a theory to prove.”

Then she darted up the stairs after Erin, hearing only a “Christ alive, your breath is awful,” behind her.

-

_28) Finish a jigsaw puzzle_

_29) Pull an all-nighter with someone else_


	3. Chapter 3

“Can you stop making such a racket over there?” Erin finally looked up. “What are you even—oh. Is that a Rubik’s Cube?”

“I’ve finally recovered enough from the jigsaw to try my hand at another kind of puzzle.” Holtz poked her tongue between her teeth as she hopelessly spun the cube.

“Do you want any pointers?”

“While I don’t doubt that you secretly like, hold the world record for solving one of these things with your eyes closed or something, I want to do this myself.”

“Oh.”

Erin sounded hurt.

Holtz looked up. “Not that I don’t live for your fine instruction, Gilbs. This just seems like a solo activity.”

“I get it.”

Holtz looked down at the cube. “If I get stuck, I’ll—”

“Can you keep it down? Some of us are trying to work.”

Holtz didn’t respond, but tried to keep her clicking and rotating quieter.

Erin still gave up with a sigh a minute later, gathered up her notebook and pencils, and went downstairs.

-

When Erin returned half an hour later, she seemed in a much better mood. There was AC downstairs, that was probably it.

She set her notebook and pencils down and took in the cube on Holtz’s desk.

Her eyes narrowed. “Holtz.”

“Mmm?”

“Did you take that apart and put it back together?”

“Of cooourse not.”

“You can not in good conscious put that on the wall! You cheated!”

“I solved a Rubik’s Cube,” Holtz said. “I solved it the only way I knew how.”

Erin stared at her.

“Scoot over,” she said. “We’re starting over.”

She eagerly moved out of the way so there was room for Erin to move her chair over, but she surprised her by coming and wedging herself beside her in her chair, her thigh half overlapping Holtz’s. She picked up the cube and began rescrambling it with those incredibly adept fingers of hers.

Holtz leaned her chin on Erin’s shoulder. “So what’s the trick?”

“There are several,” Erin said. “I’ll start by teaching you my own moves.”

“You’ve got moves?”

“I’ve got moves,” Erin confirmed.

Holtz gestured at her to continue. “Hit me.”

_33) Solve a Rubik’s Cube_

_34) Solve a Rubik’s Cube without cheating_

-

“I’ve got an idea.”

“A Mop Log idea?”

“A Mop Log idea,” Holtz confirmed. “One that I think you’ll really enjoy, if I know anything about you.”

Erin looked suspicious at that.

She came with her anyway, without asking what it was.

-

Holtz held the door to the studio open for her.

“Pottery?” Erin asked with a tilt of her head and smile.

“Thought we could—” Holtz wiggled her fingers— “get our hands dirty.”

“Any particular reason you thought I would enjoy this?”

“Flirty answer or regular answer?”

“ _Regular_ , Holtzmann.”

“You seem like the type of lady who can appreciate the value of a hand-thrown mug.”

“Oh. That’s true.” A pause. “What was the flirty answer?”

“Didn’t ya hear my line about getting our hands dirty?”

Erin turned crimson.

“So,” Holtz said when she didn’t get a response. “Was I right? Think you’re going to like this?”

“Well, I—” Erin rolled her shoulders back— “I enjoyed it the last time I did it.”

“Damn it, you’ve done this before?”

“Yes, just once. Well, besides when I did it in school, but that doesn’t count. Everyone’s done that.”

“Quoi?”

“You know, like when a local potter came to your class and doled out little lumps of clay, and everyone made a little lopsided pot, and then they took them off to the kiln where a few of them inevitably broke and shattered some poor kids’ dreams?” At Holtz’s blank stare, Erin frowned. “Did you not do that?”

“Uh, one time I made a stop-motion movie with plasticine. Does that count?”

Erin thudded her palm into her forehead. “Oh, duh, homeschooled. Don’t know why I always forget.”

“Just out of curiosity, how much of public school _was_ arts and crafts? Because I continue to be surprised to hear what constituted learning.”

“Shut up,” Erin mumbled.

“So what did you make?”

“A very nice pot—one of the best in the class. Mine didn’t break.”

“I meant the other time you did it,” Holtz said. “Presumably in your adult life.”

“Oh.” Erin’s cheeks had been steadily returning to a normal colour. They weren’t now. “Uh, I made a mug. It turned out decently—I still use it.”

“Wait, the blue one? _You_ made that?” Holtz blurted. “It’s so good!”

“Yeah, I—” Erin broke off, eyes narrowing at her. “When did you—”

“Overactive imagination.” Holtz pressed two fingers to her temple. “I haven’t seen the mug you’re describing.”

“Holtzmann.”

“Or snooped in your cupboards while you weren’t there.”

“H—”

“Or snooped in any of your other things.”

Erin sighed.

Holtz extended an elbow to her. “Pottery?”

-

Erin threw a perfect vase.

-

Holtz threw a mess.

-

“I’m not that good at it, not really,” Erin argued. “Clay is just…very forgiving.”

“Yeaaah, I don’t think mine is going to be forgiving me any time soon.”

_35_ ) _Pottery_

_-_

“Holtz, I can feel you staring at me.”

“I don’t mind.”

“ _I_ do.”

“I’m theorizing.”

Erin looked up from her calculations. “Can you theorize somewhere else?”

“This is my desk.”

“Fine, can you theorize _without_ staring at my face, then?”

“The two are interrelated.”

“The—what?”

Holtz pulled her feet off her desk. “Gotta go—I have something I want to test.”

Erin perked up. “A new weapon?”

“Nope.” Holtz hopped up, and at Erin’s fallen expression, patted her on the shoulder on her way past. “That’s at three.”

-

She returned an hour later, coming up beside Erin and slamming a hand down on her desk. “Pole dancing.”

Erin jumped. “Oh my god, you scared me.” A pause. “Did you just say pole dancing?”

Holtz sat on the edge of her desk. “Pole dancing.”

“Learning or…watching?”

“Learning. No entry for watching.” Holtz winked.

“Because you’ve already—no, I don’t want to know the answer to that.” Erin cleared her throat. “So. Pole dancing? Uh, right now?”

“Why not?”

“Well, I doubt there are any classes on right now. I can check the schedule for the place I usually go to…”

“I was actually thinking we’d just use the firepole—hold on, _the place you usually go to?_ ”

“It’s…good exercise.” Erin bit her lip, and her cheeks did the thing that they did best.

Holtz stared at her. And continued to stare at her.

“Stop staring at me.”

“I’m not,” Holtz said. “I’m theorizing.”

“About _what?”_

“About how my theory might be right.”

“What? What theory?”

Holtz ignored her and slid off the edge of her desk, striding over to the pole hole. She hung off the pole and stopped to give a salute. “See you downstairs for dance lessons in five,” she said coyly, then jumped.

_36) Learn pole dancing_

-

Holtz had been standing in front of the Mop Log for ten minutes, hands on her hips.

“Hey, Erin, come here for a second,” she called.

There were footsteps on the stairs seconds later, and when Erin cleared the top, she was slightly out of breath.

“What is it?”

“I have a half-baked hypothesis I want to run by you.” Holtz paused. “Ooh. Half-baked. Hey, after this we should—”

“Please do not say get high.”

Holtz chuckled. “I was going to say we should go invent an ice cream flavour.”

Erin frowned. “How did you—”

“Half-baked. Ben and Jerry’s. Ice cream. C’mon, Gilbert, you gotta get better at following my trains of thought. The Holtzmann Express waits for no passenger.”

“Right, and what station did it leave from again, Holtz?”

“Oh, right, my hypothesis. Tell me, Gilly-Gil,” Holtz said, leaning against the wall while Erin’s nose wrinkled at the nickname, “is there a single thing on this Log that you hadn’t already done prior to us doing it together?”

The colour to Erin’s cheeks told her everything she needed to know. Fascinating.

“Well, in that case.” Holtz rubbed her hands together. “I think I need to start getting more creative with my brain babies.”

Erin shifted in place. “I really don’t think that you do. Really.”

“Are you kidding? I need to take at least one of your virginities.”

Erin grimaced. “ _Please_ never say that again.”

Holtz ignored her, peeling herself up off the wall and entering into Erin’s personal space instead. “What kinds of things have you never done?”

Erin swallowed, her throat bobbing. “You’re going to have to discover that for yourself.”

Holtz pouted. “No hints?”

“You’re a scientist, Holtzmann.”

“I’ll get there.” Holtz poked her in the chest. “Mark my words. I’ll find something that you haven’t done yet.”

Erin sighed. “Oh, I’m sure you will.”

“I just never imagined I’d live in a world where I’ve led a less interesting life than Erin Gilbert. You’re putting me to shame.” She licked her lips, looking her over. “I like it.”

Erin crossed her arms smugly.

Holtz stepped around her, then paused and looked back. “By the way, did you _want_ to get high? Because if that’s something that you haven’t—”

Erin tilted her head, a small smile adding to her smug expression.

“Oh, damn, _really?_ Beaten to the punch _again?_ ” Holtz whistled. “Alrighty then. I’ve got my work cut out for me.”

-

“I,” Holtz said before Erin had even made it to her desk the next morning, “am breaking out the big guns.”

Erin shut her purse away in her drawer. “Good morning, Erin, how are you doing today? Good morning, Holtz—I’m good, thanks for asking! How are you doing?”

“Are you rehearsing a play?”

Erin gave her a look.

Holtz flashed a wide smile. “GoodmorningErinhowareyouthat’sgoodI’mbreakingoutthebigguns.”

“Try that again,” Erin said dryly.

“Goooooooooooood moooooooorrrrrniiiiiing Errriiiiiiiin hoooowww aaaaaaaare—”

Erin waved her hands. “Stop. Just stop.”

Holtz’s smile widened.

“Insufferable,” Erin muttered under her breath.

Holtz licked her lips. “Don’t you want to hear what the big guns are?”

“I’d rather see for myself.”

“Ooh, _saucy_. And brave.”

“I mean the last set probably broke at least a dozen federal regulations for weaponry, so I’m not sure how much bigger you could get,” Erin said.

“Oooooh.” Holtz clicked her tongue. “I see where we went wrong. I meant metaphorical big guns. You thought I meant literal.”

“Wait, there aren’t literal big guns?”

“With me? Always. But that’s not what I’m talking about.”

Erin didn’t look wary before. She did now.

“Is this…a Mop Log thing?”

“You bet your sweet saucy skirt it is.”

Erin looked down, smoothing her hands over her thighs. “It’s a skort.”

“A _skort?_ You’re wearing a motherloving _skort?_ ”

“Yes,” Erin said.

“A _skort?_ ”

“Yes,” Erin said again. “Why is that so hard to believe?”

“What I can’t _believe_ is that you managed to find a _skort_ in this day and age.”

“They’re out there. If you know where to look. Probably not in any of the stores _you_ shop in.”

“Jillian Holtzmann only shops in three types of stores.” She counted on her fingers. “Grocery, thrift, and hardware. Unless you count dumpsters as stores.”

“I do not.”

“I’ve seen some crazy-ass things in thrift stores, but even I have never organically come across a _skort_. What kind of geriatric shops are you hitting up, Gilbert?”

“The is a young person’s skort,” Erin said defensively. “Do you see where the hem hits? Who do you think the age demographic for this is?”

Holtz peered around the side of the desk. “Not you, that’s for sure.”

Erin crossed her legs self-consciously. “I thought I was pulling it off,” she mumbled.

“Oh, you _are_. You look smokin’. You’re the only person I know who could rock a skort.”

“You’re making fun of me.”

“I would _never_ joke about how hot you are.”

“Alright,” Erin muttered, not meeting her eyes.

“You’ve gone and distracted me with your tantalizing skort. I was telling you about the big guns.”

“Right, yes. Do elaborate.”

Holtz leaned forward. “Do you remember when I said I was going to have to kick it up a notch with my ideas? To find something you hadn’t done before?”

“…Oh no.”

“Oh yes.” Holtz swept her arms wide. “I’m breaking out the big guns.”

“I don’t like the sound of that.”

“You ready to hear it?”

“No?”

“Three words.” Holtz grinned and wiggled her eyebrows. “Get. A. Tattoo.”

Erin’s mouth opened and closed.

Holtz mimed dunking a basketball. “Did I bring the big guns or _what?_ ”

“Yep, yes, definitely, uh huh, that’s…the big guns, right. Yeah. Because it’s…yep.”

Slowly Holtz’s smile faded and her eyes narrowed instead. “Wait.”

Erin was looking literally anywhere but her.

“Erin. _Erin_. Do you have a tattoo?”

“Nope,” Erin squeaked. “Of course not. That would be…crazy! I don’t. You won! You brought the big guns. You found something I haven’t done. I haven’t done that. That would be crazy. No siree! No tattoo for me!”

“Oh my god.” Holtz jumped out of her chair and rounded the desk. “Oh my god. You have a tattoo.”

“ _No!_ ”

“You _do_. Where is it?”

Erin pressed her lips into a hard line.

Holtz sat on the edge of her desk. “Okay, _what_ is it?”

“I’m not _telling you_.”

“But you admit that you have one?” Holtz asked with glee. She poked her in the ribs. “Come on, show me!”

“I _can’t_. It’s in a…sensitive place,” Erin gritted out.

“Now isn’t the time for modesty,” Holtz said, reaching for the buttons of Erin’s shirt.

She swatted her hand away. “ _Hey_. _No_.”

“No? Lower half?” Holtz jokingly started to bend towards Erin’s skort.

“ _Holtzmann_. Stop trying to undress me! This is a _workplace.”_

Holtz leaned back with a wicked grin. “Has that been all that’s been stopping us this whole time?”

Erin crossed her arms over her chest and rolled back in her chair so there was a foot between them.

“I’m kid-ding,” Holtz said, enunciating the two syllables. “Boy, I didn’t think your chest was _capable_ of getting that red. So…where is it?”

Erin huffed.

Holtz tilted her head. “No? Nothing? Throw me a bone here. You just foiled the plans I spent all night cooking up. The least you can do is tell me more about your secret tattoo. I _gotta_ know what kind of tattoo Erin Gilbert would get. Is it artsy? Nerdy? Meaningful? Random? A quote? Something found in nature? A _ghost?”_

“I’m not. Telling you.”

“Do you regret it?”

“ _No_ , thank you very much. I _happen_ to like it. A lot.”

“How long have you had it?”

“I’m not answering that.”

“Booooo.”

“Can we just drop it?” Erin shifted in her seat.

“Fiiiiine. I hope you enjoy depriving me.”

“I do.”

“I’ll find out eventually, you know.”

“Holtzmann, I swear to gosh, if you throw my dressing room door open while I’m changing into my gear one day, I will _kill you_.”

“Why, that doesn’t sound like me. What an _incredible_ invasion of privacy that would be.”

“Right, like you’re no stranger to invasions of privacy.” Erin rolled her eyes.

“Maybe so. But a peeping tom I am not. I am _offended_ that you would think otherwise.”

“You literally tried to unbutton my shirt less than two minutes ago.”

Holtz winked.

“Can you get off my desk and let me get to work, now?” Erin asked.

“No can do—we’ve got an appointment in half an hour.”

“ _Half an hour?_ ”

“Yeah, I know, cutting it a little late. I didn’t anticipate this conversation taking so long.”

“You’re _going?_ To get a tattoo? Right now?”

Holtz tapped her watch. “Not right now. Half an hour from now.”

“Holtz, that’s…that’s…”

“Craaaaazy?”

“ _Impulsive_.”

Holtz stared at her for a few moments, then turned to look very slowly at the wall behind her.

“Okay, yeah, point taken,” Erin grumbled. “But—a tattoo, Holtz? Really? I mean, I—I’m kind of shocked you don’t already have one, to be honest, but…”

“Nope, no tattoos on this bodacious bod,” Holtz said cheerfully. “It was always too permanent of a decision for me.”

Erin blinked at her.

“So you’re not going to do it?” she asked hopefully.

“Nuh uh.” Holtz wagged her finger. “When I want to do something, I do it. Mop Log 101, baby.”

“But—you just said it’s too permanent of a decision—come _on_ , Holtz, just because you said you were going to do it, doesn’t mean you have to actually follow through. I mean, for the sake of what?” Erin gestured at the wall. “An entry? You only came _up_ with this one because you thought it was too out there to be something I’d done before. You don’t _actually_ want to do it.”

“Of course I do,” Holtz said. “Why wouldn’t I? It’s a tattoo, not a root canal.”

Erin sighed with resignation.

“Now come on,” Holtz said. “We’re going to be late.”

“ _We?_ ” Erin paled. “ _I’m_ not getting a tattoo.”

“ _Another_ tattoo,” Holtz pointed out.

“I’m not getting _another_ tattoo,” Erin said.

“But you wouldn’t let me go alone, would you? All alone, nobody to hold my hand? You wouldn’t do that.”

Erin sighed and pulled open her bottom drawer to get her purse.

They were halfway down the stairs when Holtz added, “But just so you know, I _did_ book two artists.”

-

Erin did not get a(nother) tattoo.

Holtz happily conceded the loss and paid the spare artist for their wasted time.

(It was worth it to know that there was still a secret tattoo hidden somewhere under those delightfully impossible clothes).

-

(She was going to find it one day).

-

_37) Get a tattoo_

-

“The real question,” Holtz said, even though Erin hadn’t asked a question, “is where to go from here.”

Erin didn’t look up. She was trying to make up the morning’s worth of work that they’d missed during Holtz’s appointment. “Hm?”

“I’m at a loss,” Holtz said, gesturing behind her at the wall, where the ink was barely dry. The ink on her inner upper arm, on the other hand, was still tingling in a pleasing manner. “I was _so certain_ about this idea. To find out that you’d already done it has shaken my confidence.”

“It’ll grow back.”

“I need to go back to the drawing board. I _have_ to find something you haven’t done.”

“I don’t know when the Mop Log became all about trying to one-up me,” Erin mumbled.

Holtz sat up with interest. “One-up you? You think I’m trying to one-up you?”

“Why else would you be so determined to find something I haven’t done?”

“Not to _one-up_ you! Because I want you to be _included_.”

“I…” Erin looked up. “I’ve always been included. In everything.” She gestured at the wall too.

“I mean _yeah_ , you’ve _been there_ , but I want us to be _equals_. I told you, I want to take at least one of your virginities.”

“And _I_ told you to never say that again.”

“Well, clearly you tuned it out the first time. I mean it, Er. I want to experience something for the first time with you. I mean, I know _your_ favourite part of all this is _spending time with me_ ,” she teased, “and mine is too, but it’s also really frickin’ fun trying something for the first time. I want that for you too.”

Erin bit her lip. “Better get thinking, then.”

“I _have_ been,” Holtz groaned. “I already brought out the biggest guns I _had_. Now what am I supposed to do?”

“You’re an engineer,” Erin said dryly. “Building bigger guns is your favourite pastime.”

“That’s _true_. But what’s bigger than getting a tattoo? Hmmm…”

“Maybe you should try thinking smaller instead.”

“Jillian Holtzmann doesn’t think small.”

“Erin Gilbert might.”

“Nah,” Holtz said with a grin, swivelling back and forth in her chair. “I refuse to believe that.”

-

“Hey,” Abby said, stopping at her desk. “Where’s Erin?”

Holtz was focusing very intently on the proton gun she was rebuilding. “Bathroom.”

“Oh. Patty and I are going to get lunch—you want anything?”

Holtz set down her tools and stretched her arms over head, letting her back crack. She hadn’t moved in a while. “Surprise me.”

“Roger that.” Abby turned to leave, but paused in front of the wall. “Are you ever going to explain what the hell all that is?” She gestured at it.

Holtz spun around in her chair and looked up at it contemplatively.

“I guess, in a strange way, it’s a character study of Erin Gilbert.”

-

“You gotta help me out here,” Holtz said with a groan. She was upside down on the couch, her feet draped over the back of it.

Erin was very preoccupied petting one of the Fuzzies. Holtz couldn’t tell which one from this angle. “Hmm?”

“It’s been a week, and I’m no closer to solving this conundrum,” Holtz said.

“What, your decoherence issue? I told you, your math is wrong. I _tried_ correcting your wave function for you and you threw a Twinkie at my head. And then ate it off the floor.”

“Not _that_ conundrum,” Holtz whined. “My Erin Gilbert conundrum.”

“Oh…the Mop Log one, you mean?”

“You need to give me a hint.” Holtz tucked and rolled, kicking Erin in the stomach as she scrambled upright.

“Oof. My _organs_ , Holtzmann.”

“Is that a hint?” Holtz perked up. “Organ donation?”

“ _No._ ”

“Alright, alright. Come on, give me something to work with. At least tell me if I’m getting warmer or colder. What about more extreme sports?”

Erin hesitated. “Colder.”

Holtz moved in closer, heartened by her willingness to participate. “Okay, what about anything to do with food?”

Erin considered that. “Meh,” she said, teetering her hand. “I’m a pretty adventurous eater. I’d say colder.”

“Okay, uh…regular sports?”

“Played most of them.”

Holtz gritted her teeth. “What about…obnoxious tourist destinations?”

“Colder, definitely colder.”

“Thank god. Uhhhhhhhhh…arts and crafts?”

“Colder.”

“Events?”

“I…guess warmer? I mean, there are an infinite number of events out there. So maybe, or maybe not.”

“Skills?”

“I have a lot of those.” Erin bit her lip. “I don’t mean to sound braggy, but…”

“No, no, you’re very skilled. I vehemently agree.” Holtz sighed. “I’m not getting anywhere with this. Alright, uh…I’m just going to throw out the first ideas that come into my head. Uhhhh…learning to unicycle.”

Erin’s cheeks went scarlet. “My parents sent me to circus camp when I was young.”

_“Circus camp?_ You, _Erin Gilbert_ , went to _circus camp?_ ”

“Shut up.”

“I…I just…wow, Gilbert, you’ve rendered me speechless.”

“Shut _up_.”

“Okay, so…no circus activities. What else…ooh. Joining Kevin’s ultimate frisbee league!”

Erin turned impossibly redder.

Holtz sat up straighter. “ _Seriously?_ ”

“I was trying to…get to know him better,” Erin said, hiding her face behind Fuzzy Two’s body.

“I’ve always heard that the key to a man’s heart is to get close to his di—”

“ _Holtzmann_.”

“—scs.” Holtz finished with a wink. “So that’s still going on, then? You ’n lover boy?”

“No,” Erin grumbled. “This was like a year ago. He kicked me off the team.”

Holtz flashed a wide grin. “Excellent. Out of curiosity, what else did you try in order to get to know him better?”

“Nothing,” Erin said stiffly, the little liar.

Holtz dug her fingers into Erin’s side where she was most ticklish. “Tell me.”

Erin squealed and squirmed away from her. “You’re going to make me squish the Fuzzy!”

Holtz clambered over her to straddle her lap. “Tell meeee.” She lifted the Fuzzy out of Erin’s grasp and held her out of harm’s way.

Erin looked up at her, eyes wide. “I didn’t—there wasn’t—I didn’t do anything else.”

Holtz let Fuzzy Two climb onto her shoulder. “I don’t believe youuuu.” She placed her hands on Erin’s shoulders and leaned towards her, adopting her best supervillain voice. “I’m going to ask you again. What else did you try?”

She was close enough to hear Erin swallow.

“N—nothing,” she said shakily. She could see Holtz about to protest. “ _Really!_ I mean, sure I may have exaggerated some of my interests, and maybe tagged along with him to do a few things that weren’t exactly my favourite—”

Holtz raised an eyebrow.

“—but I was just trying to spend time with him, because I thought if we hung out and did stuff together, he would see that I liked him, and—” Erin broke off, breathing.

Holtz stared at her.

“And?” she prompted.

“That’s it,” Erin said. “I wanted him to know I liked him, so maybe something would…happen.”

“You never planned on making a move?”

Erin shook her head slowly. “I…I didn’t know if…if he…liked me.”

They stared at each other.

“He didn’t,” Holtz blurted.

Erin’s eyes widened, something akin to disappointment in them.

“Kevin didn’t like you. Doesn’t like you. Never liked you.” Holtz inhaled a shaky breath. “He doesn’t even look at you, Er.”

Erin held her gaze. “I know,” she whispered. “You’re right—he doesn’t even look at me.”

Holtz, very slowly, moved her hand from Erin’s shoulder to catch a section of her hair that was stuck to her face. She didn’t tuck it behind her ear or anything, just held it between her fingers.

“Have you ever dyed your hair?” she asked, voice a little hoarse.

Erin looked thrown. “What?”

“Your hair. You ever dyed it?” Holtz asked again, trying to reinflate her voice with bravado.

“Yeah? You were…there.”

“Oh. Right.” Holtz clucked her tongue. “Garfield. I remember. Damn it.” She plucked Fuzzy Two off her shoulder and rolled off Erin, flopping into the couch beside her. “Well, back to the drawing board, I guess,” she said with a lopsided smile.

“Yeah,” Erin said, a beat later. “I guess so.”

-

Holtz kept up with her quest, periodically throwing out ideas at Erin throughout her days, trying to find the One.

“Swordfighting?” she asked while the team was testing weapons on the roof.

“We are _not_ getting swords,” Patty said with a swift shake of her head. “That right there is a recipe for becoming human shish kebabs because some ghost swiped one off our backs when we weren’t looking.”

Erin knew what she meant, though. “Yes, once. I enjoyed it.”

Holtz leaned against the table of treats. “Fascinating. Did you win?”

Patty waved at her. “Hello? Did you not hear me?”

“Yeah,” Erin said with a laugh. “I’m pretty nimble. And my aim is good too.”

“Oh man. We gotta get you a sword.”

“Abby, are there words coming out of my mouth?” Patty threw her hands up. “Can you even see me? Am I invisible?”

“We may as well be,” Abby muttered.

-

“Have a professional photo shoot,” Holtz said, meeting Erin’s eyes in the rearview mirror of the Ecto as they sped towards a bust.

“Another?” Abby didn’t look up from texting in the passenger’s seat. “I don’t think the Mayor’s office will pay for another one this soon after the last.”

Erin didn’t say anything, just pointed at Abby with a smirk.

“Forgot about that,” Holtz mumbled, hitting the gas.

-

“Have you ever seen a psychic?” Holtz asked, one fist propped under her chin.

“There was one at our prom,” Abby said, reaching for a handful of nachos from the tray between them. “Right, Erin?”

“Right,” Erin confirmed. “Everyone did it.”

Holtz added a second fist below her chin. “You went to prom?”

Erin licked cheese off her fingers. “What, for a second there were you considering taking me to crash some senior prom somewhere?”

Holtz grinned. “You wanna?”

Patty slid into the booth with a new drink just as Erin was laughing.

“What’d I miss?” she asked.

“Shh, Holtz is asking Erin to prom,” Abby said.

Erin swatted her arm.

“Oh, don’t let me interrupt,” Patty said, taking a loud slurp from her drink.

“I was serious,” Holtz said. “I never got to go to prom.”

Erin’s expression softened.

“Didn’t miss much,” Abby said. “In fact, this is basically it right here.” She gestured around.

Holtz quirked an eyebrow. “A…bar?”

“Drinking, dancing…probably somebody making out in the restroom—” Patty bobbed her head. “Yeah, it’s actually pretty damn close.”

“In thaaat case,” Holtz trilled. “Dance with me, Gilbert?”

Erin looked mortified. “I haven’t had nearly enough to drink for that.”

Holtz batted her eyelashes at her. “Are you really going to shoot me down? On my _prom night?_ ” She gasped and clutched at her chest.

“It’s not—ugh. Okay.” Erin pushed Abby. “Let me out.”

“With _pleasure_ ,” Abby said, shuffling out of the booth to let Erin squeeze past.

Patty was about to move as well, but Holtz beat her to it by crawling out over her lap.

“Hey, you’re gonna make me spill my— _Holtzy_.”

Holtz’s boots landed on the floor with a thump. She turned back to kiss Patty’s head. “Loveyouuu.”

She grabbed Erin by the hand and exuberantly tugged her out to the dance floor. They didn’t usually come to bars like this, the kind with loud music and lots of people, but their usual dusty haunt was, well, haunted. Or at least it had been until earlier that day, when they’d busted the rowdy fellow haunting it—and during the process seen enough of the kitchen and its say, questionable health practices, that Erin firmly declared that they were never setting foot there again.

So they were trying something new, something dark and loud and sweaty, and they were gonna motherfuckin’ dance.

Erin was pretty stiff at first, but she loosened up after the first song or two, slipping into the kind of Erin Gilbert Dancing that she did when it was just them. Jazzy fingers, rocking hips, ponytail swinging as she raised her face to the ceiling.

She got so into it, in fact, that she didn’t notice Abby and Patty over by the DJ booth, fighting with the dude behind it.

Nor did she see them slip him a wad of bills.

When the slow, cheesy song begrudgingly burst from the speakers a minute later, there were boos and jeers aplenty from the dancing crowd. The DJ threw his hands up in surrender and pointed at Abby and Patty, who were standing by the booth with matching shit-eating grins.

Erin spluttered.

Abby waved.

“I _think,”_ Holtz stage-whispered by Erin’s ear, “that we’re supposed to sway now.”

“I’m not going to _slow dance_ like a _middle schooler_ —”

“High school senior,” Holtz corrected.

“—just so _they_ can have a _laugh_.”

“I think they actually did this for me,” Holtz said. “Y’know, no prom and all?”

That got Erin’s attention. “Oh.”

“We’re losing precious song time,” Holtz said. “Shall we?”

Erin grumbled about it, but threw her arms around her neck. Holtz grinned and took her waist.

“I’m going to kill them,” Erin muttered, shooting looks over Holtz’s shoulder.

“They really outdid themselves with the decorations. I don’t even recognize this place.”

“Are they _filming?_ Oh my gosh, Patty is dead to me.”

“You look beautiful tonight.”

“What?” Erin tore her gaze off their conspirators.

“I said ‘thanks for dancing with me.’”

“Oh.” Erin shifted her arms. They continued to sway. “You’re welcome.”

-

“A bath!” Holtz shouted.

Erin nearly leapt from her desk. “A bath?”

“A bath.” Holtz pointed at her. “Have you ever had a bath?”

“Have I ever had a _bath?”_ Erin stared at her incredulously.

“Yeah, a bath!”

“Holtzmann.”

“Yessss?”

“How did your parents wash you as a baby?”

“Garden hose. Back steps.” Holtz mimed squeezing a trigger and made a psssshhhhh noise.

Erin’s mouth fell open.

“ _Kidding_ ,” Holtz said. “ _Obviously_ my parents bathed me. But I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about adult baths.”

“Adult…baths.” Erin inhaled and exhaled like she hated every choice that had led her to this moment. “Do I dare ask?”

“There are two kinds of adult bath,” Holtz said cheerfully. “The first…well, I’ll let you use your imagination.” She winked.

Erin blushed.

“And the second kind, the one I’m talking about, is the fancy kind with like, expensive bath bombs—by the way, did you know that ‘bath bombs’ aren’t actual explosives? Because I didn’t—or bubbles or candles or whatever.”

Erin just stared.

“I wasn’t allowed candles as a baby,” Holtz added.

“You’re not allowed candles _now_.”

“Always trying to clip my wings. So have you?”

“Had a _bath?_ ”

“An adult bath, yeah.”

“Yes, Holtz. I’ve had a _bath_. Oh my god.”

“Hmm…that’s just as well, because I just remembered that I actually _have_ had an adult bath. The first kind.” She clicked her tongue twice. “So it wouldn’t have counted anyway.”

“Oh my god,” Erin repeated.

-

Holtz came up behind Erin and dumped the heavy bundle in her arms onto her desk, right on top of her notebook.

Erin jumped a foot in the air. “ _Holtz_.”

“Hello to you too.”

“What the—is that a _tent?_ ”

“Sure is. You wanna pitch a tent with me, Gilbert?”

“I…why?”

“Why do I do anything nowadays?” Holtz spread her arms wide.

“I thought you weren’t adding stuff unless it’s something I haven’t done?”

“First of all, not true.” Holtz pointed at _39) Dance at prom_ and raised her eyebrows. “Second—you’ve pitched a tent before?”

“I mean…yeah? My family went camping a lot.” Erin eyed her, suddenly wary. “You’re not asking me to go camping, are you? Because I’m too old for that.”

“Too old?” Holtz scoffed.

“Yes, Holtzmann, when you get to be my age, there are certain things you can’t live without. Namely indoor toilets and running water.”

Holtz threw her head back and laughed.

“Don’t laugh at me,” Erin whined. “It’s true.”

Holtz collected herself. “You know, this really was only going to be pitching a tent, but now you’ve got the idea juices churning.”

Erin made a face. “Please no.”

Holtz hoisted up the tent bag. “Meet me here at 7:00 tonight with a bag packed.”

“Holtz, I refuse to go camping! Didn’t you just hear me?”

“Oh, I heard you.” Holtz shot finger-guns at her, which was a little hard given the bulky 13lb tent in her arms. “7:00pm. Don’t be late.”

-

The door to the firehouse opened and Erin poked her head in. “Holtz? I’m here— _oh_.”

“Right on time,” Holtz said devilishly.

Erin shut the door behind her, a modest backpack slung over her shoulders. “Did you go buy all of that in the last _hour?_ Oh my _god_ , Holtzmann.”

“What, this?” Holtz looked down at the array of camping materials at her feet—the sleeping bags, the cooler, the tent, the air mattress, the folding chairs—and then looked back up, leaning on her trekking pole and hoisting her massive hiking backpack back over her shoulder where it was threatening to slip off. The cookware clanged within. “Of course not—”

“Oh thank god.”

“—I bought the tent this morning,” Holtz finished with a grin.

Erin groaned.

“I have ascended to the final phase of dykery,” Holtz bellowed, raising her free hand to the heavens.

“You’ve ascended to _something_ , all right,” Erin muttered.

“Enough with your squawking and grab some gear.” Holtz fed the strap of one of the chairs over her other shoulder, wedged the air mattress bag under her armpit, and looped the drawstring of one of the sleeping bags over her wrist. “We’ve got a long hike ahead of us.”

“A _hike?_ Holtzmann! I didn’t dress for a hike!”

“You take the tent and the other sleeping bag and chair,” Holtz instructed. “We’ll double-team the cooler, yeah?”

“I hate you,” Erin said as she followed suit with the other sleeping bag and chair and picked up the tent. “I hate you so much. The things I do for you—”

“Alright, grab a handle of the cooler, and we’ll lift on three. One—”

“Three,” Erin cut in. The cooler flew up. “Oh my gosh, is there even anything in there?”

“Of course,” Holtz said. “What, you think I would make us carry an empty cooler just for the sake of authenticity?”

Erin glared at her and dropped her side of the cooler, flipping open the lid instead. “I’m going to kill you.”

“Alriiiight, we can leave the cooler behind.”

Erin sighed, adjusting the chair falling off her shoulder. “Let’s just go. Get this over with.”

“Your wish, my command. Onwards!”

Then Holtz turned on her heel and began marching towards the stairs.

“What are you— _Holtz_.”

“Keep up, Gilbert!” Holtz shouted over her shoulder. “You’re falling behind! I don’t want to lose you out here—you’ll blend right in with all that tweed; rescue helicopter will never spot you.”

“You—you’re—”

Erin didn’t finish the sentence, if it was even meant to be one, but there were footsteps on the stairs behind Holtz.

“Are we camping in the lab?” Erin asked, new concern in her voice. “Because _absolutely not_. I can’t even _begin_ to list all the safety hazards.”

“Of cooourse not. How crazy do you think I am?” Holtz winked over her shoulder. “The Mop Log is only for things I _haven’t_ done before.”

Erin spluttered after her as they cleared the second floor and continued to the next set of stairs.

“I should have expected this, I guess,” she said.

“Should have trusted me, more like,” Holtz said.

They made it to the third floor.

“Your indoor plumbing, m’lady,” Holtz said, sweeping her trekking pole.

Erin dropped the tent on the kitchen table and looked around. “I don’t really know where you think we’re pitching this. There’s not much room in here.”

“I agree,” Holtz said, eyes sparkling, one foot already on the bottom step of the last staircase.

Erin looked at her, understanding dawning. “Are we camping on the roof?”

“We’re camping on the roof, baby,” Holtz said with a hoot.

-

Erin couldn’t stop laughing.

“Again—what kind of engineer _are_ you?”

“ _Nuclear_. Not—not an engineer of—of _poles!”_ Holtz floundered hopelessly. “ _Why are there so many poles?_ ”

Erin continued to laugh.

“How dare you laugh at my peril instead of coming to help me,” Holtz wailed.

“This is so much funnier,” Erin managed to get out. “You’re the one who wanted to pitch a tent.”

“I don’t think this is meant—” Holtz nearly poked her eye out with one of the poles— “to be a solo activity. It says right on the bag—four person.”

“That’s how many people _fit_ in it,” Erin said, still laughing.

“Come help meeeeeeeee.”

“Alright, alright, I’m coming,” Erin said, picking herself up off her chair. “I just don’t understand how you got them _so tangled_.”

“There’s strings! Strings, in the poles! Why the fuck are there strings in the poles?”

“Oh right, your kryptonite. Strings,” Erin deadpanned.

Holtz dumped the poles onto the concrete with a clatter and let out a loud strangled screech.

“Shh. People are going to think someone is dying up here,” Erin chastised.

“Someone _is_ ,” Holtz said dramatically, wiping her sweat-covered forehead with the back of her hand. “ _Fuck_ , it’s so hot. Why is it _so hot?_ ”

“Don’t look at me,” Erin said, picking up the fallen poles and beginning to slot them together with ease. “You’re the one who wanted to go camping on a roof in the middle of Manhattan in the dead of July.”

“I have…regrets.” Holtz flopped into the chair Erin was just sitting in. “We might die up here tonight.”

“It’ll cool down when it gets dark,” Erin said.

“Maybe we _should_ camp in the lab,” Holtz mused.

“Nope, no, absolutely not. I would rather die up here than die in there,” Erin said. “Also, you better come help me. I’m not doing this alone.”

“I’m meeeelllltiiiiing,” Holtz said in her best Wicked Witch voice, sliding down in her chair.

Erin snapped her fingers at her. “Don’t be dramatic. Get over here. You don’t get the Mop Log entry for pitching a tent if you don’t contribute.”

Holtz groaned and rolled off the chair. “Don’t you throw my own rules back in my face.”

Erin shoved some of the now disentangled and assembled poles at her. “These need to go in the pegs.”

“The pegs?”

Erin pointed. “At the base of the tent. Thread them through the clips on the top.”

“The— _ooh_. I see ’em. Were those there before?”

“Yes.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“You really sure?”

“Holtzmann.”

-

“Not half bad, huh?”

They were standing inside the surprisingly roomy tent.

“This is a very nice tent,” Erin conceded. “I don’t want to know how much you spent on it.”

“What about how much I spent on this very cushy air mattress?” Holtz held up the bag. “I figured your indoor-plumbing-needing geriatric butt might also need, uh, back support?”

“I’m going to ignore the insult there,” Erin said, “because as it so happens, yes, I do. Thank you for not making me sleep on the concrete.”

“Let’s get this bad boy up and runnin’, huh?”

-

By the time they had inflated the air mattress (using an electric pump that Holtz built herself, that Erin made her swear up and down three times wasn’t nuclear) and set up their sleeping bags and inflatable pillows, the tent had heated up considerably and they had to escape outside.

Holtz strung a tarp over their chairs—she needed to MacGyver it a little, tying it to the stairs enclosure, the edge of the tent, and the ledge lining the roof. Erin said she’d prefer if it was covering the tent, but Holtz argued that they wouldn’t be sleeping for hours and could use some shade while they hung out.

“Might as well tend to my plants while we’re up here,” Holtz said, skipping towards the row of pots at the edge of the roof while Erin collapsed into her chair.

Erin glanced over her shoulder. “What are you even doing to those, by the way? I’ve always been too scared to ask.”

“Scared of _science_ , Gilbert? That’s not like you.”

“I have an appropriate amount of fear concerning a lot of what you consider to be _science_.”

“No need to be scared,” Holtz said, fondling one of the leaves of the closest plant. “I’m not doing anything too crazy. Most of them I’m just fertilizing with ectoplasm in various concentrations. For some of them, I’m trying to splice their DNA with it directly—but I’m not a biologist, so it’s a little slow-going.”

Erin’s nose wrinkled. “What do you hope to…accomplish? Glow-in-the-dark tomatoes?”

“No, silly Erin, I’m hoping to once and for all determine the answer to the question: Are ghosts alive?”

“What?” Erin spluttered. “That’s…you can’t…”

“Okay, maybe not. But I _do_ have serious questions about ectoplasm as organic matter. You know I’ve been running tests with it for ages, doing chemical analysis, all that jazz. It doesn’t _particularly_ seem like the kind of substance to sustain life. And yet, Erin, I ask you this.” She swept her hand over the plants. “If it’s as dead as we thought it was, then why do my plants look _so damn good?_ ”

“Maybe you’re just a really good gardener.”

-

“Holtz? Hello? Where are you? I leave for five minutes to go pee and you—”

“In the tent!”

A few seconds passed, and then Erin’s head poked through the door. “Oh.”

“Where’d ya think I went?”

“I don’t know. I thought maybe you abandoned ship.”

“Please, I would _never_.”

“What are you doing in here? It’s…so warm.”

“I got hungry,” Holtz said, and produced from behind her back a bag of Stay Puft marshmallows and a blowtorch.

“Oh god—Holtz, don’t you _dare_ light that in there—”

Holtz grinned.

“ _Holtzmann_. _No_. No! The entire tent will go up! Do you know how flammable polyester is?”

“Less than cotton, definitely less than wool, but the main issue with synthetics is that they _melt_. And nobody wants a faceful of melted plastic. Why do you think I’m always trying to get you to change your clothes?”

“Because of their _relative flammability?_ Are you kidding me?”

“You could stand to get a little more fire resistant. You know, for me.”

“Are you _planning_ on lighting me on fire?” At Holtz’s eyebrow wriggle, Erin’s eyes narrowed. “ _Literally,_ not _metaphorically_ , Holtzmann.”

“Baby, I can light you on fire any time you want.”

Erin grimaced. “Stop that.”

“Why, is it lightin’ a fire in you?”

Erin gave her a sharp look. Holtz’s thumb twitched on the blowtorch. Erin’s eyes darted to it—she missed nothing.

“ _Don’t you dare_.”

“Move out of the way, then, I’ve got a campfire to rustle up outside.”

Holtz barged out of the tent, blowtorch and marshmallows in hand, and Erin leapt out of her way.

“By ‘campfire’ you better mean ‘using that blowtorch to roast marshmallows in a safe and responsible way,’ because you are _not_ lighting an _actual campfire_ on the roof of this building. I forbid it.”

“Aw _man_. What’s the point of even keeping the name ‘firehouse’ if you guys aren’t going to let me start fires anymore?”

“That’s not—you know that that’s not why it’s called a firehouse, right? It’s important to me that you know that.”

-

They were sitting across from each other in their chairs, Erin watching as Holtz torched marshmallow after marshmallow.

“You’re going to burn yourself.”

The flame _was_ dangerously close to Holtz’s sticky fingers, but dangerously was her favourite way to live.

“I think you’ll find that my fingers are very resilient,” Holtz said.

Erin blushed, but it may have been sunburn.

“Besides,” Holtz said, offering the latest perfectly-charred marshmallow to Erin, “if I’m going to burn myself on something, it’ll be the molted marshmallow—which is precisely 200 degrees hotter than the flame itself.”

Erin’s eyes widened as she reached out to pull the marshmallow from Holtz’s fingers. “Really? 200?”

“I dunno,” Holtz said with a grin. “That’s based off anecdotal experience and assumption.”

She popped her fingers in her mouth to clean off the marshmallow residue, and didn’t miss Erin staring as she did so.

-

Night fell, and so did the temperature. They got ready for total tent transference—Erin disappeared inside to get ready for bed, and Holtz busied herself with taking down the tarp. Erin was convinced it was going to fall down in the middle of the night otherwise and scare the shit out of them.

After that, she got ready herself. She brushed her teeth over in the corner of the roof with a bottle of water for the real camping experience, and then got changed in the tent.

“Wow, uh, I guess modesty isn’t one of your middle names?”

Holtz looked over her shoulder to see Erin, half into the tent, hand covering her eyes.

“To be fair,” Holtz drawled, “I _was_ in private. But you are correct. You can come in, by the way. Half-in, half-out doesn’t look very comfortable.”

Erin stumbled her way into the tent, still covering her eyes. “Sorry, I probably should have announced my arrival before coming in—but in my defence, the door was unzipped.”

“Oh, you didn’t know that I’m a bit of an exhibitionist?”

Erin choked a little.

“Kidding,” Holtz said before Erin could get worked up. “I just didn’t think you’d be back so soon. I figured you the type to have a nighttime routine that takes like, at least a half hour.”

“Well…yeah, I do,” Erin said sheepishly. “But we’re roughing it.”

“Are we?”

“Well…okay, not really, but still, I only brought the necessities with me.” Erin hesitated. “Uh, no offence, but how long does it take to put a shirt on?”

Silence.

“Holtz?” Erin very cautiously peeked through her fingers, and then—

Her hands dropped to her sides with an exasperated sigh as she took in Holtz, lounging on top of her sleeping bag with her hands behind her head, fully clothed.

“How long did you just make me stand here unnecessarily covering my eyes?”

“A minute and three seconds,” Holtz said.

“I hate you.”

“You coming in?” Holtz patted the other sleeping bag beside her. “Water’s great.”

Erin rolled her eyes, but zipped the tent closed behind her. She returned her toiletries and clothes to her neat little backpack, then crawled onto the air mattress beside Holtz. She sat on top of her sleeping bag and pulled her knees to her chest.

“Look at us, Gilbert,” Holtz said. “Camping. Sleeping under the stars.”

“Can’t see the stars,” Erin pointed out. “Light pollution.”

“ _Technically_ we can’t see the stars because there’s a tent in the way.” Holtz pointed at the ceiling.

Erin rolled her eyes.

“Also, just because we can’t see them doesn’t mean they’re not there,” Holtz said matter-of-factly. “I know Abby was the one who studied astrophysics, not you, but has your big squishy particle physicist brain not developed object permanence yet?”

“Shut up,” Erin said, giving her a shove.

Holtz yelped and rolled right off the edge of the air mattress, landing with a thump on the floor of the tent. “Jeepers, that concrete is a bitch.”

“I swear I didn’t shove you that hard!”

“Oh, I know, I just wanted to get a taste of what my night’s gonna look like. I’m a very restless sleeper. Ten bucks says I end up on the ground by morning.”

“Fun fact about sleeping bags: they’re very restrictive,” Erin said. “Like the sleeping equivalent of a straitjacket. I think you’ll be contained just fine.”

-

Which would have been true if it wasn’t like, still a hundred million degrees in the tent. Even with the nighttime temperature dip, and the slight breeze that rustled the tent walls, inside those four walls was basically still a sauna.

All that to say that they weren’t sleeping so much as they were trashing around and sweating (not in the fun way, though), their sleeping bags unzipped and flung open.

Yes, Holtz ended up on the concrete several times.

-

When Holtz woke up (an encouraging sign—waking up meant that sleep had happened at some point through the night), there were three things that she noticed.

  1. Her homemade electric pump was probably not the most effective, because the air mattress was sunken under their weight in several places, and the familiar, unforgiving concrete was digging into her back something fierce.
  2. Sleeping bags, as a concept, kind of only worked when you zipped them up. If you didn’t zip them up, they were basically blankets, and blankets had a tendency to go rogue. Which was to say that Holtz’s sleeping bag was currently on the other side of the tent, and she was…kind of sharing Erin’s. Well, there was approximately two square inches of it touching her, so _sharing_ might have been an over-exaggeration, but the fact remained that approximately a third of her body was pressed up against Erin’s, and vice versa.
  3. Though it had finally cooled down considerably in the dead of night, enough to spur on the kind of heat-sharing cuddling they’d clearly gravitated towards, it was now, simply put, sweltering. The tent seemed to be generating its own heat, which seemed like a fascinating scientific discovery, but one that would have to wait for later, because for now all Holtz could focus on was that she’d never been so hot in her life. She was drenched in sweat, all the way down her probably-now-fucked-up-for-life back.



If the tent wasn’t hotter than the surface of the sun, so hot she could barely breathe, she may have stuck around for a while to appreciate the moment—but it was, and she couldn’t, so she carefully rolled away from Erin, dumping herself right onto the floor because there wasn’t much separating her from it to begin with, and she let herself out of the tent.

It was cooler outside, much cooler. Airflow was truly a miracle—they probably should have unzipped the mesh windows overnight.

Holtz dropped into one of the chairs, rolled her neck from side to side, and checked her watch. It was just after six. She wasn’t quite sure how it was possible for the tent to have gotten _that_ hot when by her calculations, the sun had only been up for 28 minutes, but that was yet another problem that she didn’t really care to solve at this present moment.

It wasn’t too much later when there was rustling from the tent, and Erin called out her name.

“Out here,” Holtz called back.

Erin emerged, sleepy and sweaty in her own Erin Gilbert way, yawning into her fist as she stepped out of the tent flap. “It feels early.”

“It is,” Holtz agreed.

“It’s really hot in there.”

“I know, that’s why I left.”

Erin sunk into the chair opposite her. “Well, that was an interesting night.”

“How’s your back?”

“Uhhhh…it’s…”

“Yeah, mine too. Shwoops. My fault.”

“No, no, it’s not. It’s fine. That’s what chiropractors are for, right?”

“Have you got a good chiropractor? Because mine kept trying to sell me life insurance on the side, which kinda spooked me.”

Erin snorted. “Yeah, mine’s good. I’ll give you her number.”

“Cheers. And cheers to surviving camping.”

Erin lifted an imaginary cup, and then gazed at her hand longingly. “You think we can wrap this up and go get some coffee?”

“Absolutely.”

-

Holtz refused to go through the ordeal of taking down the tent, so they left it there.

(And promptly forgot about it until the next time they were testing weapons).

“The hell is all this? Holtzy, are you _squatting up here?_ ”

Holtz and Erin shared a look and then promptly burst into laughter.

_40) Pitch a tent_

_41) Go camping_

-

Holtz was lying on the floor of the lab, which was admittedly a sort of disgusting (and very dangerous) place to be. From where she was, she could see something under her desk that was _just_ furry enough to either be a decomposing mouse or a long-lost spring roll. Bit of a toss up, really.

“I have never been so baffled in my life,” she said with a long sigh.

Erin looked down at her from where she was sitting at her desk. “Um…same.”

“It’s just like…how is this so hard?” Holtz swept her hand over her brow. “How has it been, what, over a month? Since I started trying to find something that you haven’t done before? How have I not found anything yet? Who _are_ you, Erin Gilbert?”

“Don’t take it so personally,” Erin said.

“I’m _not_. I’m just…determined. Hell bent. Consider it a Mop Log endeavor of its own, to find something you haven’t done. I _need it_.”

“Well, maybe you’re trying too hard.”

“Bah.” Holtz waved her hand, and it landed on Erin’s foot. She grabbed around her ankle and pulled it closer.

“Hey—let go of me.”

“Where do you even _find_ shoes like this?”

“They’re…sensible.”

“No. These don’t make sense. At all.”

“That’s not what sensible means.” Erin tugged her foot from her grasp and wheeled to the far end of her desk, out of reach.

“Have you ever read fanfiction?” Holtz asked.

“Wh—what?”

“Fanfiction. It’s—”

“I know what fanfiction is. The question just surprised me.”

“I’m just thinking out loud here. Fanfiction. Have you read it?”

“I—yeah? I guess? Some?”

Holtz propped herself up onto her elbows with interest. “Reaaaally? That’s…shocking.”

“What? It’s not—it’s not that crazy? Lots of people…”

“No, I _know_ , but I just figured you’d be weirded out by it.”

“Why would I be weirded out by it?”

“I mean it weirded _me_ out, and that’s saying something. You really don’t think it’s an invasion of, I dunno, privacy or something? You’re very into privacy.”

“Why would it be an invasion of privacy?”

“Because it’s us?”

Erin swivelled towards her so fast she nearly fell off her chair. “Wait, _what?_ What are you talking about?”

Holtz raised an eyebrow. “Fanfiction?”

“About _us?_ ”

“Yeah, what did you think we were talking about?”

“Fanfiction about—not _us!_ Oh my god, Holtzmann— _us?_ Like…like the Ghostbusters?”

“No, like _us_ ,” Holtz said.

“Oh my god,” Erin said again, covering her mouth. “Are you serious?”

“Uh, yeah. Some of it’s pretty good, actually.”

“ _You’ve read it?!_ ”

“In my defence, I didn’t know what I was reading,” Holtz said.

“At what point did you _realize?”_

“When our tongues started battling for dominance,” Holtz deadpanned.

“Oh my god. Oh my _god_. I can’t believe you— _Holtz_. That is _such_ an invasion of privacy!”

“Oh, so you do think so.”

“Of course I think so!”

“Noted. You know what I also noted? The fact that you said ‘yes’ at first.”

“I—”

“You’ve read fanfiction. What kind?”

“I’m not telling you that.”

“Have you _written_ fanfiction?”

Erin’s cheeks coloured.

“You _have_ ,” Holtz said with glee. “What kind?”

“I’m not telling you.”

“Why not? Is it…a lil naughty? Is it gaaaaaay?”

Erin held up a hand to quiet her. “It was a very long time ago. I don’t even remember,” she mumbled.

“Buuuuuullshi—”

“I’m not telling you!”

“Why noooottttt?”

“Because if it’s…still out there—which I don’t think it is—then it’s in a small enough corner of the internet that you’d be able to find it if you knew where to look.”

“Ooh-hoo, _that_ is a dare if I ever heard one.”

“ _No_ , _Holtz_. I just said—it’s probably not even there anymore!”

“Oh Erin. Sweet, naïve Erin—”

“I’m not naïve!”

“—don’t you know that things on the internet are there forever, unless you properly wipe all traces of them? And considering you think it’s ‘probably not even there anymore,’ I’m willing to bet that you didn’t even do the bare minimum of deleting it, let alone executing the kind of full-scale purge needed to keep it out of the hands of lil Hacker Holtzy.”

“That’s—that’s—”

“How long ago are we talkin’? College years?” Holtz peeled herself up off the floor (really peeled—her lab coat was stuck to something sticky) and sat up excitedly. “Does Abby know?”

“No,” Erin said, but the blush was back, because Erin Gilbert was a terrible liar.

“ _Abby?”_ Holtz called at the top of her lungs.

“ _What?_ ” came the muffled shout from the first floor.

Meanwhile, Erin had launched herself off her chair at Holtz, and was currently wrestling her on the floor, trying to get a hand over her mouth.

“ _Never mind_ ,” Holtz shouted, dodging Erin’s hand and grinning at her.

Erin sat back on her heels, still straddling her, and crossed her arms. She looked around her. “This floor is disgusting.”

“Shh, it can _hear_ you.”

“It’s not sentient.”

“It might be. Have you seen some of the things growing around here? I think there’s a radioactive Hot Pocket kicking around in the corner that I swear moved the other day.”

“The…the snack food? Or like, an actual pocket of radioactive heat somewhere in this lab? Because that’s _incredibly_ concerning.”

“The snack,” Holtz confirmed. “Though I’d argue it’s a meal.”

“You need to clean this place,” Erin said.

“Uh, excuse you, I’m not the only one who works here.”

“You don’t even let me touch half the things in here—you expect me to clean them?”

Holtz frowned to herself. “Hmm…good point. Would have to get you a level A hazmat suit. Maybe evacuate the block.”

Erin rolled her eyes and finally pushed up off of her, dusting off her hands and sitting back in her chair.

“Oh, right, don’t try to distract me with cleaning,” Holtz said. “We were in the middle of a very important revelation.”

“I’m not telling you, Holtzmann.”

“That’s fine, that’s okay, I’ll just add that to the score of things you refuse to tell me about. I’ll figure it out one day. Mark my words. I’ll find your secret fanfiction, and your secret tattoo, and everything else you’re hiding from me.”

“Sure, whatever,” Erin said, but her voice was teasing.

Holtz flopped back, tilted her head to look behind her at the Mop Log. “And I _will_ find something you haven’t done. I swear, I—”

She paused.

Squinted at the wall.

She’d looked at it a hundred times, but never upside down, and she was going to blame _that_ for the fact that she _missed this_.

She flew upright so fast that she smacked her head on the edge of Erin’s desk. “Ow, fuck—how could I have been so _stupid?_ ”

Erin examined her with concern. “Maybe you shouldn’t have been on the floor in the first place?”

Holtz ignored her and scrambled to her feet, pointing at the wall. “It’s been staring at me this _whole time!_ ”

“What has?”

Holtz strode over and slammed her hand right over the big _1)_

Erin jumped. “What’s—”

“Are you telling me that you ‘Number one create a Mop Log’ed _before me?_ Huh?!” Holtz pulled her hand from the wall and smacked it against her forehead instead. “It’s been _right here_ this whole time! Are you _kidding me?_ ”

“Okay, I would just like to point out something—”

Holtz whirled on her. “You knew! You’ve known this whole time!”

“Well, yes, but let me just—”

“I’ve been a fool.” Holtz flung herself into her chair, letting it spin.

“Okay, but here’s the thing: who was the one who came up with the name ‘Mop Log?’”

“Me,” Holtz said.

“No, no, you said ‘What’s the opposite of a bucket?’ and I said ‘A mop’ and you said ‘The Mop List—no, I don’t do lists. The Mop Log?’ and that’s how the Mop Log started and _therefore,_ technically, _technically_ , I created the Mop Log before you.”

“That’s—nuh uh! I’m the one who said ‘Mop Log’ for the first time!”

“I came up with the Mop part, and it would be nothing without that! The Log part was a given!”

“You do _not_ get to claim credit for the Mop Log,” Holtz protested. “I’m the one who birthed the brain baby, I wrote it on the wall, it’s mine! You did _not_ do it before me.”

“ _Technically_ —”

“We’re not going with _technically_. _Technically_ you _haven’t_ done everything on this list before, so _there!_ ”

“But I thought the whole point was that you wanted to find something that I haven’t done before so we can do it together? Huh? You really want to deprive yourself of ‘taking one of my virginities’ over a technicality?”

“I’m impressed that you said that without grimacing.”

“There was an internal grimace,” Erin said.

Holtz threw her hands in the air. “Okay, fine, fine, you’re right. I’ll let it go—as long as you admit that I’m right.”

“It’s a gray area,” Erin muttered.

“Close enough. Now back to the matter at hand. I think, because you’ve been sitting on this information this whole time, you owe me a hint about something that you _actually_ haven’t done before.”

“You don’t need hints.”

“I clearly do.” Holtz gestured at her. “You’re an enigma. An Erinigma?”

“But I’m not,” Erin said. “Don’t you get it? All of this—” She pointed at the wall— “just proves that we think very similarly. Everything you’ve wanted to do and done, I’ve also wanted to do—I just did it before you.”

Holtz pouted.

“We can chalk that up to me having a decade’s head start,” Erin said with a dismissive wave. “The important thing is that we…basically have the same Mop Log. So maybe you need to stop trying to think outside of the box of things that I might not have done, and start thinking outside of your _own_ box.”

“I don’t know how to think outside of my box,” Holtz said.

“Okay, I’m going to ignore what I assume was a dirty joke given the timbre of your voice there. Holtz—it’s not hard. Just…stop thinking about what _I_ might not have done, and maybe think instead about what you would never usually dream of doing? Think outside your own comfort zone, not mine? Because if this list—log—is any indication, they might actually be the same.”

“Worth a shot, I guess,” Holtz said. “Not like I’ve been having much luck.”

Erin crossed her arms smugly.

-

“This,” Holtz said, flipping up her welding helmet, “is not working.”

Erin was just getting back from upstairs with her second cup of coffee of the morning. “Of course it isn’t. I told you, your math is wrong. Again.”

“Is nooot,” Holtz whined. “And that’s not what I meant. I _meant_ your whole ‘think outside the box’ thing.” She waved the torch in her hand at Erin.

“Put that away.”

Holtz obliged, shedding her helmet and gloves. “The problem is that I keep thinking of things that I _know_ you’ve done already—like scrapbooking, or going to the library, or playing Bingo—and it’s like, how can we be so similar yet _so different?_ ” She shuddered.

Erin was gaping at her. “You’ve never been to the _library?_ ”

“Uh…”

“You—you have two bachelor’s degrees, a master’s, and a PhD and you’ve _never been to the library?_ How is that _possible?_ ”

“I never finished the first one,” Holtz said.

“Yeah, okay, one of these days you’re going to have to explain to me how you ended up _one credit shy_ of a degree and didn’t _get it_ —but not right now, because right now you need to explain _how you’ve never been to a library before_ , oh my _god_.”

“Changed my mind—two felt greedy,” Holtz said with a shrug.

“ _Greedy?_ That’s…neither here nor there.”

“Well, it’s certainly not _here_ , or it would be on the wall with my others.” Holtz jutted her chin at the ceiling, indicating the wall upstairs where all of their collective degrees were displayed.

Erin pressed her fingers to her temples. “Can we focus here? On the fact that you’ve _never been to the library?”_

“I’m not exactly ‘library material,’” Holtz said with aggressively exaggerated air quotations. “All those books…so close together…so flammable…”

Erin wrinkled her nose.

“Plus,” Holtz added, “I’m too loud for libraries.”

“I…won’t deny that. But I just don’t _understand_ —I mean, how did you do research?”

“Loudly, alone.”

“How did you do your theses?”

“Loudly, alone.”

“How did—”

“Erin, I’m gonna save you some trouble—the answer to all these questions and more is ‘loudly and alone.’” Holtz paused and quirked the corner of her mouth. “Actually, sometimes it’s ‘loudly and with a special friend.’” She winked.

Erin blushed deeply. “But where do you get your books?”

“Alternative libraries.”

“What is—” Erin squinted at her. “Are you talking about dumpsters?”

Holtz leaned against the edge of a workbench with a grin. “Dumpsters…the side of the road…sticking out of purses on the train…”

Erin balked. “ _What?_ That’s stealing!”

“I don’t _steal_ them, I _borrow_ them. Isn’t that what a library is?”

“Not when it’s out of people’s _purses_.”

“I always make sure to return it before their stop. Well, most times.”

“Oh my god.”

“Nah, I’m kidding. I’m not actually much of a reader. Books are just so _long_ and _boring_.” Holtz tipped her head back with a groan.

“What? Books are amazing!”

Holtz lifted her head and twirled her finger in the air. “I’ve got a mild case of the ole dyslexia, so most times it’s more work than it’s worth, y’know?”

“Oh…” Erin frowned. “I…I didn’t know.”

“Don’t get me wrong, I’ve read plenty of books. _Oh, the Places You’ll Go…Beowulf…Fifty Shades of Grey_ …”

Erin bit her lip, avoiding her eyes.

“And of course, I’ve read your book,” Holtz tacked on casually.

Erin looked up. “You…you read my book?”

“Of _course_.”

“Wow, I…I’m really flattered, Holtz…”

“More or less flattered than you were when you found out that lil sociopath read it?”

“More,” Erin said immediately. “Considering you didn’t use it to take over the world.”

“Yet.”

“And also I’m touched that you would read nearly 500 pages of pseudo-science, most of which was written by a couple of high-schoolers, especially if reading isn’t your favourite thing in the world.”

“And I did it before I even knew how cute you are,” Holtz said proudly. “That’s real dedication. Plus, this was back when there was only one copy, and Abby kept it locked in a safe. So, extra dedication.”

“Wait, what?”

“Yeah, it was back when I’d just started working with her. We didn’t really know each other yet. She kept this locked safe right smack in the middle of the lab—I actually broke my ankle one time because it got in my way when I was dancing—and she wouldn’t tell me what was in it, just warned me that if I ever stabbed her in the back, I’d be locked away in a box like that for the rest of time. Kinda thought she had a body in there, to be honest.”

Erin covered her face. “Oh my god.”

“Was pretty disappointed when there wasn’t.”

“Of course you were.”

“I broke into it one evening after she’d left for the day. Found the book, read it cover to cover that night, by light of a Bunsen burner in the lab—by the way, if you ever get your hands on Abby’s OG copy, there uh, might be a few singed pages.”

Erin shook her head.

“Had it back in the safe by the time Abby got in next morning, none the wiser. But the damage was done—it was all up here.” She tapped her forehead. “Well, mostly up there. I also snapped a few photos. Just for future reference.”

“Photos? Of what?”

Holtz held up a finger and dig her phone out of her back pocket, thumbing the cracked screen until she found what she was looking for and turned it to Erin.

Erin grabbed the phone from her, squinting at the screen. “You…you took a picture of my author photo?” She looked up. “Why?”

“Science.”

“Did you take a photo of any…of the _actual_ science in the book?”

“Nope,” Holtz said cheerfully. “Just the inscription.”

Erin frowned. “Inscription?”

Holtz reached over to swipe to the next photo. Erin held the phone an inch from her face.

“I…forgot I did that,” she whispered.

“I didn’t know the story at the time,” Holtz said, “but it seemed important.”

Erin looked like she was going to cry as she handed the phone back. “Thank you,” she said softly. “For documenting that.”

Holtz smiled fondly down at the grainy picture of Erin’s handwriting, bearing the words _Thank you for believing me_. She clicked the power button, the screen going black, and shoved it back in her pocket.

“Did Abby ever find out?” Erin cleared her throat. “That you broke into her safe and read the book?”

“Yeah,” Holtz said. “A few months later, we got plastered and she told me everything—the whole story about you and the book and all that jazz. And I told her that I’d already read it and that it was the greatest thing I’d ever read.”

“That’s…not saying much,” Erin said, tugging on her bangs self-consciously. “You’ve read like four books.”

“That wasn’t a _list_ , dingus,” Holtz said, giving her a playful shove. “They were _examples_.”

“Still,” Erin said, but she was laughing.

“Nah,” Holtz said, mouth split into a wide smile. “I stand by that. You’re brilliant, Erin. Always have been. Even when you were a wee high-schooler.” She adopted a thick Scottish accent for the last bit.

Erin met her gaze for several seconds, searching.

Then she held out her hand abruptly.

“Come on.”

Holtz took it without so much as a breath. “Where to?”

“I’m taking you to the library.”

“ _Excellent_.”

-

“Does Patty know?”

“Do you think I have a death wish, woman? Of course Patty doesn’t know. And we’re going to keep it that way, yeah?”

Erin laughed. “Yeah, Holtz. I’ll keep your dirty little library secret.”

“Ooh, speaking of which, I think there’s another reason I’ve never been to a library.”

“What’s that?”

“I think I have a _titch_ of a librarian kink.”

Erin swatted her arm as they emerged onto the street from the subway stop. “ _Holtz_.”

“What can I say? I got a thing for tweed.”

“That’s—” Erin came to a halt and somebody behind them crashed into her. “I think you’re thinking of a professor kink.”

Holtz’s eyebrows shot to the sky. “Oh _really?_ ”

Erin, quite surprisingly, did not blush. “Librarians don’t wear tweed. They’re more…sweaters, I think.”

“I’m into those too,” Holtz said without missing a beat.

Erin rolled her eyes, but took her hand again and tugged her towards the iconic entrance of the New York Public Library.

“Figured we might as well go all out for your first time,” she said.

“How many books?” Holtz asked, eyeing the building.

“Two and a half million, I think,” Erin murmured.

“That’s a lot of…paper…”

Erin came to an abrupt stop again, this time right below one of the famed lions, and Holtz collided with her.

“Empty your pockets,” she said.

“Is this a mugging?” Holtz asked.

Erin gave her a look.

Holtz turned her pockets out, placing the contents one by one into Erin’s waiting palms.

“If I didn’t _know you_ , I’d legitimately assume you were an arsonist come to destroy the library,” Erin said dryly as the third lighter joined the pile.

“How do you know I’m not? Maybe I’ve never been to a library because I’m banned.”

Erin sighed and then blinked at what Holtz had just produced. “Why the hell are you carrying around a barbecue lighter?”

Holtz dropped it on top of its smaller counterparts. “Why am I carrying around _any_ lighters?”

“That’s a good point,” Erin muttered.

“They’re fun to collect,” Holtz said, answering her own question. “Plus you never know when the mood will strike.”

“The mood to light something on fire?” Erin shook her head again. “Never mind. Don’t answer that. I’m throwing these out.”

“Not that one,” Holtz whined, plucking one of them from Erin’s grasp. “That one is cool.”

“Fine, you can keep that one—but it’s staying in _my_ pocket, thank you very much.”

“Alriiiiight.”

-

“So what do you think?”

“There are a lot of books.”

“Yes, there do tend to be books in libraries.”

“I haven’t seen any hot librarians yet,” Holtz said, shielding her eyes and sweeping her head from side to side like she was scanning the horizon from a distance. She landed on Erin. “Hot professors, on the other hand…”

“I’m not a professor anymore,” Erin said with a roll of her eyes. “I’m going upstairs—enjoy storytime.”

“Oh, I _will_.”

Erin paused in walking away to look over her shoulder. “And Holtz—please don’t scar any children.”

“Can make no such promises,” Holtz called after her, then dropped into a beanbag chair.

-

It wasn’t exactly easy to track down Erin afterwards—it took a misuse of the tracking app she’d installed on all their phones for use during busts, and even then she kept getting lost in the stacks. She finally found her, standing beside a shelf with her nose buried in a thick book, mouthing silently as she read along. It was one of her most endearing habits.

“Look what I got!” Holtz said at full volume.

Erin leapt a foot in the air, dropping the book. “ _Jesus,_ ” she hissed.

“No, it’s Holtzmann.”

Erin bent to retrieve the fallen book. “You can’t just _sneak up on me_ like that.”

“I wasn’t _that_ quiet. You were just enthralled.” Holtz gestured at the book with the item in her hand.

Erin caught sight of it. “Is that a library card? You got a library card?” She was so excited. It was so cute.

“Sure diiiid,” Holtz trilled.

“That’s amazing! That’s so great! That’s—” Erin had come close enough to take the card from her— “ _got to be at least a decade old_. Oh my _god_. Did—have— _Holtzmann_.”

“Yeeeesss?”

Erin looked up at her, gaping. “Have you been to the library before?”

“Erin,” Holtz said solemnly. “I have 1.9 bachelor’s degrees, a master’s, and a PhD. Of course I’ve been to the library before.”

Erin’s mouth fell open even further. She smacked Holtz’s arm with the book. The library card fluttered to the floor. “You _lied_ to me!”

Holtz grinned and rubbed her arm. “And you bought it. Without even questioning it!”

“I questioned it!”

“You just _accepted it!_ I’m nearly 36 years old and you just _accepted_ that I’ve never been to a library before!” Holtz cackled.

“I hate you _so much_.”

Holtz snatched her library card up off the floor and fanned herself with it. “Do you?”

“Did you lie about…about everything? About the reading, and…”

“Oh, no, that was all real. I don’t read much, and when I do I mostly get my books from other sources. But sometimes it’s nice to read something that doesn’t waft the smell of garbage at you with every turn of the page.”

Erin stared at her.

“I guess that means no entry for the Mop Log,” she grumbled.

“Noooooope.” Holtz started to lean against the shelf, but Erin caught her before she could. “Still though, this was a lovely way to spend an afternoon, Gilbert.”

“You mean it?”

“Any time spent with you is time well spent,” Holtz said. “Even if you did throw out all my lighters.”


	4. Chapter 4

They were at the beach.

Summer was rapidly winding down, and it was a hot day, and they hadn’t had a call in a while, so the five of them had escaped to the coast to be one with the sand and the surf.

Patty was asleep, a book covering her face. Abby was swimming. Kevin was building sandcastles.

Holtz and Erin—

“You know, I never would have pegged you for a string bikini kind of woman,” Erin said. “Like, ever.”

“It’s not my first choice,” Holtz admitted. “I’m actually a naked kind of woman, but this beach doesn’t allow that, so this is the next best thing.”

Erin choked on her lemonade. Holtz watched her, amused.

“Why am I not surprised?” she got out.

“Uh, ’cause you know me,” Holtz said. She hopped up off her towel. “Hey, you know what we should do?”

“Don’t you dare take off any part of that swimsuit,” Erin warned.

“Didn’t you _just_ hear me? Don’t worry, I only do that on the _special_ beaches.” She waggled her eyebrows. “Next time we do this, remind me and I’ll take us to—”

“No, _no_.” Erin held up a hand.

“Party pooper. Okay, so you want to hear what I was _actually_ gonna suggest?”

Erin sighed and screwed the cap on her lemonade. “Do I?”

“I want you to bury me in the sand.”

“Why?”

“Because it’ll be fun. I’ve never been buried in the sand before.”

“It’s not fun.” Erin crossed her arms. “My brother and his friend did it to me one time. They had to hold me down—I was kicking and screaming the whole while.”

Holtz clicked her tongue. “Yeah, alright, that doesn’t sound fun. But this will be! You can even turn me into a mermaid.”

“You? A mermaid?”

“What? I could be a mermaid.”

“Nope. I can’t see it.”

“A siren, then? I’d be a great siren. I’ve been told I’m very…enticing.”

Erin bit her lip. “No comment.”

“Plus, luring men to their death? Now _that_ sounds right up my alley.”

Erin rolled her eyes behind her sunglasses, but was smiling.

“So you gonna bury me in the sand or what, Gilbs?”

“Of course I am.”

-

Erin dumped another load of sand on her using a plastic shovel they stole from Kevin.

Holtz was quite comfortable and content. She could easily fall asleep if she wanted to. Even if there was sand in all her nooks and crannies.

Then, all of a sudden—

“ _Fuck!_ Shit FUCK damn _shit_ motherfuckeeeeerrrrrrr—”

Erin leapt up from her, hurling the shovel about ten feet away. “What? What’s—”

“ _CRAB_ —” Holtz shouted. “There’s a _crab—_ on my _ass_ —I have an _ASS CRAB, Erin!”_

“Oh my god!” Erin dropped to her knees again and began clawing the sand off of her as fast as she could.

“Ow ow ow ow ow ow FUCK—”

Erin had removed enough of the sand that Holtz was able to wriggle free and roll onto her stomach.

“Get it _off_ _me!_ ”

“I don’t—I don’t want to touch—” Erin stammered.

“Are you kidding me? You can _touch my ass, Erin!_ This is a matter of life and death!”

Erin whimpered, and then there was a particularly nasty tugging, followed by an even more painful release that caused Holtz to let out another string of expletives.

Erin flung the crab—a moderately-sized bugger—even further than she’d thrown the shovel. Holtz dropped her face into the sand. Her left buttcheek stung something fierce.

And then Erin’s hand was on it again, brushing away grains of sand.

Holtz lifted her head and looked over her shoulder. “Now you’re just being cheeky.”

Erin’s face was as red as a bad sunburn. “I’m just checking to see if it broke the skin.”

“Suuuure.”

“For the record, I didn’t want to touch the _crab_. Not your…”

“Ass. Buttocks. Derrière. Rear end. Caboose.”

“Whatever.” Erin stood. “Can you walk?”

“I dunno,” Holtz said. “You might have to kiss it better.”

“I’m not kissing your ass, Holtzmann.”

Holtz grinned and pushed herself up, shaking the sand off her as she did so. “Your loss.”

Abby showed up, dripping seawater. “Everything okay? I heard shouting.”

“Everything’s fine. Holtzmann just had an ass crab.”

Holtz slung an arm around Erin’s shoulders. “And Erin saved my life.”

“Forget I asked,” Abby said, and took off at a jog.

_42) Be buried in the sand_

-

“You’ve _got_ to stop dropping things on my desk,” Erin said with irritation. Then she looked up, saw what it was, and screamed, leaping up out of her chair and scrambling away. “Holtzmann!”

“Her name is Penelope,” Holtz said happily.

“ _Get it off!_ ”

“ _Her_.”

“Get her _off_. Is—is she _alive?_ ”

On cue, Penelope moved. Erin screamed again.

“Calm dooown,” Holtz said. “You’re overreacting.”

“It’s a _lobster_. A _live lobster_. On my _desk_.”

“Yeah! Our ass crab adventure gave me the idea.”

“Get it _off_.”

“Hey, boss?”

Holtz looked over her shoulder. “Yeah, Kev?”

Kevin hooked his thumb at the stairs behind him. “There’s an ice cream on the phone for you.”

“ _An_ ice cream? Is that an actual call, buddy? Or did you spill ice cream on the phone?”

He blinked at her like he didn’t understand the question.

“Nah, you’re right, more fun when you don’t take the mystery out of it,” Holtz said. “I’ll be right there.”

“Okay, boss.” Kevin craned his head, looking around her at Erin. “Hey, you’ve got a scorpion on your desk—did you know?”

“Thanks, Kevin,” Erin called, strangled-sounding.

“You’re welcome,” Kevin said, then retreated back downstairs.

“Alright, Penny,” Holtz cooed, picking her up, “you’re just gonna have to hang tight for a bit.”

Erin edged away from her. “And then what?”

“I want to see if I can cook a lobster in a nuclear reactor.”

“ _Holtzmann_.”

“Kidding. Imma boil her.”

“You’re lucky I like lobster,” Erin grumbled.

-

It was a business called The Ice Queen on the phone—an ice sculptor who was currently being pelted with ice shards by a chilly little ghost.

The phone was also sticky, and Kevin’s mouth was purple, a mountain of popsicle sticks piled on his desk, so she was kinda right on both accounts.

-

They lost Penelope in the lab while they were out on the bust.

It took them two hours to find her again, and by the time they did, she had broken through her claw restraints and pinched through some wires that Holtz was pretty sure wouldn’t explode the city.

-

Probably.

_43) Cook a lobster_

-

“Will you teach me how to ride a bike?”

“You don’t know how to ride a bike?”

“Nah.”

“Did…your parents not have time to teach you?”

“They had plenty of time,” Holtz said, weighing her gun in her hand as she walked. They were in an abandoned warehouse investigating a possible haunting. These calls usually didn’t amount to anything—people just got spooked easily in abandoned buildings—but they had to come check it out anyway. “It wasn’t for lack of trying—they must’ve bought me at least three different shiny bikes to try and bribe me to get on one.”

“Were you scared?” Erin teased.

“Me? Scared?” Holtz kicked in a door with her boot and stepped in, sweeping the room with her flashlight. “No. Just not interested. Bikes were for kids who wanted to go places. I didn’t want to go places. I wanted to stay in my garage, building things and blowing shit up.”

Erin laughed lightly. “That sounds like you.”

“So will you teach me? I mean, I assume you know how to ride a bike?”

“I do. Bikes are also for kids who want to escape.”

Movement above Holtz caught her attention. She swung her flashlight beam up. “Don’t look now, but I think I found our ghost.”

Erin followed her gaze up to the plastic bag hooked on the rafters, rustling in the breeze. “Well, that’s a letdown,” she said, holstering her gun.

It was at that moment that a gigantic glowing beast sprung up behind her. Before Erin could scream, Holtz fired, and the ghost exploded in a shower of light and ectoplasm.

“Rule number one of ghostbusting,” Holtz said, reaching to wipe away the ectoplasm pooled on Erin’s shoulder where there had about to be a ghostly claw. She pointed her flashlight at the plastic bag again, which was now still. “There’s no wind inside buildings.”

“Rooky mistake,” Erin groaned.

-

Holtz wheeled the bicycle to a stop, knocking down the kickstand and gesturing at it with a flourish. “Look at this baby.”

Erin appraised it, arms crossed. “That is a well-used bike. I swear to gosh, if this is another library card situation…”

“Erin, you know me, right? Have I ever bought anything new in my life?”

Erin nodded her chin at it. “You found that in a dumpster, then?”

“Estate sale,” Holtz said. She ran her hand along the rusty frame appreciatively. “Added the stickers myself.”

Erin stared at it for a second, then looked up at her. “Wait—don’t you have a motorcycle?”

“Yes. This is—” Holtz found the horn on the handlebars and squeezed it— “not it.”

“No, I _know_ that, but you seriously…know how to ride a motorcycle but not a bike?”

“Yuh huh.”

“You definitely don’t need me to teach you.”

“I strongly disagree.”

“Come on. Seriously?”

“Riding a bike is just balance. Riding a _bike—_ ” She honked the horn again— “also involves coordination, which is not one of my strengths.”

“You’re more coordinated than me.”

“Mmmmmmmmmmno, don’t think so.”

“Well, whatever. You don’t need me. Go for it.” Erin waved at the bike.

“You mean you’re not going to hold the back of the bike for me, and swear to me you won’t let go, and then start pushing me at a run, and I’ll shout ‘I’m doing it, I’m doing it!’ and you’ll let go even though you said you wouldn’t, and I’ll be like—”

“Holtz, is that what you _want_ me to do?”

Holtz beamed. “Yes please.”

Erin sighed. “Don’t say I never did anything for you.”

“When have I ever claimed that?”

“Just get on the bike, Holtz.”

Holtz toed up the kickstand and mounted the bike, giving the horn another honk for good measure before finding a secure grip on the handlebars. Erin came up behind her, hand hovering hesitantly, trying to find a good place to hold onto.

“You know,” Holtz said, “cyclingweekly dot com’s article on how to teach your child to ride a bike in 45 minutes or less says that it’s best to hold onto my torso, not the bike itself.”

Erin pressed her fingers to the bridge of her nose and inhaled roughly. “You’re a menace to society.”

Holtz covered her heart with her hand. “Awe, thank you, Gilbert! You didn’t have to say that. I appreciate it.”

Erin dropped her hand and looked at her dead-on. “Does cyclingweekly dot com also recommend that children wear their _helmets_ , perhaps?”

“Oh! Thanks for reminding me—it’s in my backpack. Be a dear and grab it for me?”

Erin rolled her eyes but went to retrieve Holtz’s bag from where she’d discarded it a couple of yards away. She pulled the helmet out and shook her head slightly at the stickers that adorned it as well.

She rejoined Holtz at the bike and fitted the helmet snugly over her curls for her. She fumbled with the straps, finally managing to fit the buckle together with a snap. Her hands lingered at Holtz’s throat for a second longer than necessary.

“Safety first,” she murmured, then cleared her throat. “So…you pedal, and I’ll just…”

“A-yup.”

Erin’s hands found her waist. “Okay, I’ve got you. Go for it.”

“Of to the races we gooooo!”

She took off pedaling with gusto, and Erin yelped, scrambling to keep up with her.

-

They were out there in the dingy alley for hours, not because it didn’t take Holtz 45 minutes or less to learn, but because they were having so much fun.

_44) Learn how to ride a bike_

-

“Will you teach me how to juggle?”

Erin looked up at her from across their desks. “Why do you assume I know how to juggle?”

“You went to circus camp,” Holtz said.

Erin bit her lip and ducked her head. “I was hoping you’d forgotten I ever told you that.”

“Erin,” Holtz said seriously, “I will never forget for a single day for the rest of my life that Erin Gilbert went to circus camp.”

“Alright.”

“It will probably be my dying words. I’ll be there on my death bed, and I’ll croak out _Erin Gilbert went to circus camp_ and then I’ll kick the bucket.” Holtz keeled over in her chair, head flopping to the side and tongue hanging limply out of her mouth.

“Are you done?”

Holtz perked up again. “So will you teach me? If I don’t add _juggling_ to my Mop Log before said bucket-kicking, I’ll be incredibly disappointed. Plus, you did such a good job teaching me how to ride a bike. You’re a natural-born teacher. You should go back to professing. Actually, no, you should stay right here with us.”

Erin sighed and put down her pencil. “Do you have any balls?”

“Physical?” Holtz looked down at her lap. “No. Metaphorical? Y—”

“ _Juggling_ balls,” Erin cut in.

Holtz tapped her chin. “Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmno.”

“I think Kevin has a drawer full of hacky sacks in his desk,” Erin said. “Don’t ask me how I know that.”

Holtz hopped up from her chair. “Back before you can say the word _clown_.”

“I’m not going to say that,” Erin called after her as she ran towards the stairs.

_45) Learn to juggle_

-

They were up on the roof.

“Holtz, this is melting all over me,” Erin complained.

“Sorry, sorry, be there in a sec,” Holtz called over her shoulder. She was tending to her Ecto-Plants. They were still flourishing. Some of them were taller than her. She was mildly worried that they were going to develop sentience soon and eat her, but that was a problem for a later day.

She finished harvesting and joined Erin, dropping into one of the two camping chairs that was still out on the roof. She offered her a tomato.

“There’s not a single chance that I’m going to eat one of your radioactive ghost tomatoes, Holtz,” Erin said. “You couldn’t pay me. Now would you please take your ice cream already? It’s dripping down my arm.”

“Where’s your adventurous spirit?” Holtz chomped a bite out of one of the tomatoes like it was an apple.

“Locked in a containment unit downstairs,” Erin deadpanned.

Holtz snorted. She would have high-fived her for the joke had Erin’s hands not been occupied by two ice cream cones.

“I’m not driving you to the emergency room to have your stomach pumped for ingesting that tomato,” Erin warned as Holtz finally took her ice cream cone. “You can take yourself.”

“You worry too much,” Holtz said, although her tongue was kind of tingling. She ignored it and took a long lick of her cone, trying to get all the drippy parts.

The cone was filled with her own creation from their little foray into ice-cream-flavour-inventing. She called it _Hungry Hungry Holtz_. It was essentially three different existing ice cream flavours swirled together and jam-packed with just about every mix-in known to man. When she’d invented it, Erin had immediately called the mayor’s office and negotiated dental into their existing benefits.

Erin, meanwhile, was eating something far more heinous. Apparently once upon a time in her youth she had entered a Ben and Jerry’s contest where kids could send in ideas for a chance to win a trip to the factory, and to have their flavour go into production for a limited time. Baby Erin had _not_ had the winning idea because, in her words, the judges couldn’t appreciate the subtle genius of Raisin Bran ice cream. Holtz had lamented the fact that she never had a chance to meet seven-year-old Erin because, as she put it, they would have had a _lot_ to talk about.

Regardless of her personal horror at the concept, she had assisted Erin in making her childhood dreams come true back when she had been making _Hungry Hungry Holtz_ for number 38 on the Log, which is why there were a few quarts of each flavour in the freezer downstairs that they’d been steadily working their way through.

“I worry about you a reasonable amount,” Erin countered.

“Cheers,” Holtz said, reaching to bump her cone against Erin’s. When she brought it back to her mouth, she grimaced. “Gross, you got Raisin Bran nastiness all over my ice cream.”

“You’re the one who did that,” Erin said.

“Meh.” Holtz shrugged and took a ginormous bite.

-

There was a package leaning against Holtz’s apartment door again when they got there. She picked it up and gave it a shake, then grinned when she realized what it was.

“What is that?” Erin frowned. “That’s as noisy as a puzzle, but…heavier sounding?”

“Just a lil evening activity for us to do,” Holtz said, unlocking the door and pushing it open.

“Is it for the Mop Log?” Erin asked eagerly.

“Nope, just for fun,” Holtz said joyfully. They dumped their stuff just inside the door and she immediately tore into the box, too excited to wait.

Inside the box was another box, which contained—

“Lego?” Erin bent over the box. “Wait, hold on, is that—”

“Our firehouse? Hell _yeah_ it is!”

“Oh my gosh! Where did you even find that? That’s so amazing!”

“A little very niche corner of the internet,” Holtz said proudly. “You wanna build it? It’s also 5,000 pieces, but I have a feeling it won’t take an all-nighter to put it together.”

“Oh, _absolutely_.”

-

They were at Home Depot.

Holtz had taken it upon herself to rebuild the Fuzzies’ housing system as a summer project, but had of course waited until the end of summer to decide that, so now she was walking the aisles of Home Depot gathering all the supplies she could possibly need (and then some). And Erin was there, because…well, Erin was always there nowadays. It was technically a workday, but a slow one, so they’d skipped out only a few hours into the day.

“Ooh,” Holtz said, coming to a dead stop with the cart. “I should repaint.”

Erin gazed at the paint counter apprehensively. “Should you?”

“Why not? We could knock one off the ole Mop Log while we’re renovating. I’ve never painted a room before.”

“Really?” Erin looked very purposefully at Holtz’s paint-splattered overalls.

“I’ve painted other things,” Holtz said. “Just not walls. I suppose you have? You probably had a job as a house painter one summer, right?”

“No,” Erin scoffed. Then, under her breath, “My parents paid me to paint our house.”

“Course they did. I never had that chance—we always rented. Moved a lot.”

Erin started. “Wait—does your lease allow you to paint?”

“Definitely not,” Holtz said cheerfully. She appraised the paint samples. “What colour do you think chinchillas would like?”

“Holtz—you’re going to get evicted!”

“What my landlord doesn’t know won’t hurt him. I’ve already committed to this.”

“You can’t—”

“Aren’t you always telling me to make my apartment look more lived-in?”

Erin was quiet for a long moment.

“Not that one,” she said quietly, nodding her head at the paint chip in Holtz’s hand. “That’s garish.”

“It’s bright,” Holtz argued. “I want it to make them happy.”

“Can chinchillas even see colour?”

Holtz paused. “I’m not sure.”

Erin pulled her phone out while Holtz put _Bright Teal Surprise_ back and picked out two others.

“Chinchillas have two types of cones,” Erin read from her screen. “Red/green and blue. They have more of red/green than blue.”

“So I’m on the right track,” Holtz said. She held up the two paint samples. “ _Lucky Lime_ or _Pillow Mint?”_

“If you’re set on green, can you at least go with something a little more reserved?”

Holtz didn’t like ‘reserved.’ If she did lists, which she didn’t, she would have a mental list of adjectives that she never strived to be—and reserved would be right up there with dignified.

“What, like grey?”

“Is that a shot at my decorating sensibilities?” Erin shook her head. “Not grey. Just…something a little easier on the eyes? What about this?” She plucked a paint chip and held it up. “ _Calming Green Waters_.”

“That,” Holtz said, “is the greyest green I’ve ever seen in my life.” She grabbed another chip. “ _Elf Shoe?_ ”

Erin huffed. “ _Dusty Olive_ , then?”

“That’s brown.”

“That’s not—fine. You want bright? How’s this— _Bali Bamboo?_ ”

“That looks like baby poop. That is baby poop green.”

Erin shuddered and put it back. “Okay, yeah.”

“ _Lollipop Lime?_ ” Holtz selected another. “ _Basil Pesto?_ Ooh—I could go for some basil pesto. Lunch after this?”

“Yes,” Erin said distractedly. “Something more muted, please? How about _Mint Shake?_ You like mint shakes.”

“Oh man. Yes.”

“Yes to the colour?”

“No, yes to getting Shamrock Shakes after lunch.”

“Holtz, it’s August.”

“I know a guy.”

Erin sighed, then zeroed in on a colour. She picked up the chip and passed it to Holtz, cocking her head.

“ _Sky Diving_ ,” Holtz read.

It was definitely muted, definitely not one she would have picked, definitely pretty.

She looked up with a grin. “I love it.”

-

“How much do I need, you think? Ten gallons?”

“ _No_ ,” Erin nearly shouted. “Two,” she said, calmer, to the guy behind the counter. “Just two.”

“What if I want to paint my entire apartment?”

“You won’t,” Erin promised.

-

They got lunch at a little Italian bistro. They sat outside on the crowded patio. The Ecto was parked squarely (and illegally) at the curb in front of them, filled to the brim with wood and chicken wire.

Holtz stabbed a pesto-coated penne noodle with her fork and popped it in her mouth. As she chewed, she propped her head on her fist and watched Erin.

She was taking a sip of wine, her chin tipped up towards the sun. Her eyelids fluttered closed, and she paused there for a moment, just savouring the sun and the sip.

Then she opened her eyes again, noticed Holtz was staring at her, and cleared her throat.

“This place is much better than that dump by HQ,” she joked.

“I’m getting better at this,” Holtz replied.

“At what?”

“Picking date spots.”

Erin opened her mouth.

Erin closed her mouth.

-

They were side by side in the Fuzzies’ room, which had been vacated of the old cage system.

Holtz ran her paint roller up and down the wall, shaking her hips to the song blasting from her boombox behind them. Erin and her long arms filled in all the gaps up near the ceiling.

Erin was wearing borrowed clothes—an old band t-shirt and another pair of already-paint-covered overalls from Holtz’s extensive collection. She’d had to loosen the straps all the way out to account for the height difference, and even then she kept having to tug them down where they were riding up around her crotch.

She had paint in her hair, and more on her cheek.

Holtz told her. “You’ve got paint on your cheek.”

Erin’s hand came up to try and get it, and in doing so she managed to get even more paint on her cheek. Holtz laughed.

“Don’t you laugh at me,” Erin said.

“Or what?”

“Or…” Erin grabbed a paintbrush, dipped it in the tray, and swiped it on Holtz’s nose.

Holtz beamed.

“Wait…were you _trying_ to get me to do that?” Erin asked suspiciously.

Holtz whistled. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Erin rolled her eyes and turned back to the wall. Holtz caught her by the strap of her too-tight overalls and pulled her back.

“Is it just me, or is this—” She gestured at the painting supplies— “awfully domestic of us?”

Erin bit her lip. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she parroted.

Holtz released her overalls with a grin.

Erin began painting again, but not before mumbling something under her breath about paint fumes.

_46) Paint a room_

-

Holtz came up behind Erin and dumped the load in her arms onto her desk and lap.

“What the hell?” Erin struggled out of the massive pile of blankets until her head emerged. “Holtz, what are you—”

“Mop Looooggg! I did it, Erin! I finally found something that I _know_ you haven’t done!”

“Suffocated under a pile of bedding?”

“Ha! Ha ha!” Holtz danced around, too exuberant to be ruffled by Erin’s quip. “We’re building a fort!”

“Holtz, I _know_ you’ve built forts before.”

“Oh I have, but you know what I haven’t done, and neither have you?” Holtz held a pillow over her head. “ _Built a fort in the workplace_.”

Erin ducked her head a little. “Well…”

Holtz stopped dead. “No…no, it’s impossible. Don’t you dare.”

“I…I was a nanny one summer in college…”

“ _No._ That doesn’t count!”

“I definitely built forts on the clock—”

“In someone’s _home_.”

“It was my _workplace_ ,” Erin argued.

Holtz gritted her teeth. “That’s—that’s—”

“A technicality, but _technically_ you know I’m right.”

Holtz buried her face in the pillow and screamed.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay!” Erin said. “We can still do it! Let’s…let’s do it!”

Holtz lifted her head with a pout. “But I thought I finally cracked it.”

“I know,” Erin said soothingly. “It’s okay. You’ll get it one day. Come on, let’s go built a fort—not in the lab though.”

“But—”

“ _No_.”

“Alriiiight. Upstairs it is.”

-

“The key to a good blanket fort,” Holtz said, “is clamps.”

Erin looked up over the sheet she was holding up. “Clams?”

“Clam-p-s,” Holtz said, enunciating the final two letters. “We should go clamming, though.”

Erin nodded. “You’d enjoy it.”

“I bet I would,” Holtz said, voice thick with innuendo.

Erin rolled her eyes. “So, clamps?”

“Clamps.” Holtz held up a bag of them. “The big daddies attach to the chairs. The itty bitty babies hold the sheets together along the seam. Only sheets for the roof, obviously. We’re not amateurs over here.”

“Obviously,” Erin said. “How big are we making this?”

“Big as we can,” Holtz said. “We’ve got plenty of building materials, but we’re a little restricted by space.” She clamped a corner of one of the sheets to the back of one of the chairs that had been dragged over from the kitchen.

It was true—they had a seemingly never-ending supply of bedding. There were some bunks left over from the firehouse’s old days, a set of rickety uncomfortable beds that the four of them crashed on sometimes. It was always after late-night busts, the kind that woke them up and dragged them in, cranky and half-asleep, in the middle of the night. Usually by the time they finished it was 2, 3, 4 in the morning, and nobody wanted to trek back to their respective apartments.

So they had bedding on hand—lots of it. More than four sets. They were often too tired to shower, and usually fell into bed still sweaty and covered in ectoplasm. In the morning, their sheets joined the massive laundry bin that went out once a week for cleaning. It had only taken one week where they had two late-night calls for Patty to go out and purchase enough sheet sets so they’d have alternates. It was the same reason they all had eight jumpsuits each—although that came about after what they referred to as the Infamous Week From Hell.

All that to say that they had _plenty_ of bedding. An excessive amount, really. When Holtz crashed at the firehouse, she usually did so in the lab, face down on her desk, so she didn’t really see the point of so much bedding—

But it meant they had lots to work with.

“I can’t believe we’re building a blanket fort,” Erin said as she strung the canopy of sheets across to the other side. Holtz threw her a clamp, and she caught it out of midair and affixed the sheet to another chair. “I mean what are we, five?”

Holtz let out a loud roar-screech and began stomping around, hands curled up by her chest.

“Oh are we—are we being dinosaurs now?”

Holtz ignored her and continued to clomp, bobbing her head.

“Roar,” Erin said half-heartedly, lifting her hands flaccidly.

“Is that the best you got? You’re pathetic,” Holtz teased.

“Hey, I can _be_ immature,” Erin protested. She made a more convincing roar and mimicked Holtz’s stomping.

Holtz decided she’d rather be a pterosaur, and spread her arms into wings, taking off at a run. She circled the couch. Erin squealed and darted out of her way.

“What kind of carnivore are you, running away?” Holtz called as she chased her around the circumference of the fort-in-progress.

“I’m _not_ ,” Erin squeaked. “I’m a mild-mannered herbivore who was just minding her own business!”

Holtz caught up and collided with her. Erin yelped, thrown off-balance, and stumbled backwards. Holtz tried to catch her as she fell, but it was too late, she was falling, falling, and—

Erin grabbed hold of her and took her down with her, both of them tumbling into the newly-constructed fort, their combined weight catching the sheets and tugging them down, which in turn yanked on the ever-secure clamps—

They landed, hard, with a loud thud and crash as at least two of the chairs came toppling over on top of them.

“Oh my gosh,” Erin cried out. “Holtz—are you okay?!”

Holtz grinned down at her. Their limbs were tangled, their chests pressed together. Erin was breathing heavy.

“I’m grand—you broke my fall.”

“But the chairs—”

“Ah. Yeah.” There was, in fact, a chair digging into her back. She’d probably have bruises.

Worth it.

She reached to shove it off and then rolled off Erin so she was lying on her back beside her instead.

“I think we might need to start over,” Erin murmured. “We kind of broke it.”

“We shall rebuild!” Holtz declared in an accent that she couldn’t quite name.

She scrambled to her feet and extended a hand to help Erin up.

“Maybe no more roughhousing this time, Holtzosaurus?” Erin suggested.

Holtz roared.

-

“This is…a very nice fort.”

Holtz hummed in agreement. It was a _very_ nice fort. Solid construction, the perfect balance of airiness and coziness. The remaining bedding had formed a nest inside, which is where they currently were, their backs against the base of the couch.

“You wanna take a nap?” she asked.

“Holtzmann, it’s 4:00pm.”

“Yeah?”

“If I nap now, I’ll never sleep tonight.”

Holtz raised an eyebrow at her.

Erin sighed. “Can’t we just watch something?” She gestured in front of them, where the fort had been carefully arranged to allow for an unobstructed view of the TV. “We never get to watch anything. _Somebody_ still doesn’t own a TV, no matter how many times I’ve asked.”

“Why would I spend money on a TV when there are 82 beautiful inches of mayor-subsidized HD right here?”

“I don’t know, to keep your guests entertained?”

“Do I not entertain you enough?”

“You entertain me plenty,” Erin mumbled. “Sometimes it’s just nice to…you know. Kick back and watch something.”

“Say no more,” Holtz said, reaching for the remote. “Whaddya wanna watch?”

“I don’t care,” Erin said. “You can choose.”

“That’s dangerous,” Holtz said. She thought for approximately two seconds. “Mmmmmmmmm Doctor Who.”

“Doctor Who?”

“That alright? I’m in a Who-y mood.”

“Yeah, of course.”

“You got a season preference?”

Erin waved her hand. “Whatever. I’m not picky.”

“We’ll get a smattering,” Holtz decided. She clicked into one of their streaming platforms, also mayor-subsidized, and pulled up the show. She decided to start with something from the Nine era, because she was feeling nostalgic.

“Who’s your favourite Doctor?” Erin asked once the episode had started.

“Thirteen,” Holtz answered automatically.

“Because she’s a woman?”

“She dresses like me.”

“She…” Erin turned to look her over. “She kind of does, doesn’t she?”

Holtz grinned. She was wearing her lab coat over a tie-dyed crop top. Green suspenders held up a pair of wide-legged cropped pants, and her toes wriggled in mismatched socks that had been poking out the top of her boots up until right before she crawled into the fort.

Erin reached to fondle her silk scarf necktie. “The Doctor would rock one of these.”

“Hell _yeah_ she would,” Holtz said.

Erin smiled. She glanced up at Holtz, the scarf still between her fingers. “You know—if you told me right now that you were the Doctor…I’d believe you.”

Holtz’s grin widened. “Yeah?”

Erin bit her lip and nodded. “Timelord? Alien? Smartest person in the universe? You could totally be the Doctor.”

“I would be a _fantastic_ timelord,” Holtz agreed.

“Too bad time travel is impossible.”

Holtz’s mouth sunk into an O. “Dr. _Gilbert_.”

“What? It _is_.”

“Nothing’s impossible.”

“Time travel is.”

“Of course it’s possible—what kind of particle physicist are you?”

Erin gave her a look and finally released her scarf, slumping back against the couch. “Holtz.”

“What?”

“Yes, _theoretically—_ ”

“Theoretically is all anyone needs!”

“That’s not—”

“You’re literally a _theoretical_ particle physicist, Er.”

“I _know_ but—”

“Are we not in the practice of breaking physics every day? Making technological advances that nobody else on the planet has?”

Erin crossed her arms. “Are you saying you plan to make time travel possible? What, in your spare time?”

“Nothing’s impossible—that’s what my parents always told me.”

“Your parents clearly don’t understand the universe as well as I do.”

“My mother was an astrophysicist at NASA,” Holtz said. “My father taught quantum mechanics.”

Erin blinked. “What? Are—are you serious?”

“Yuh huh.”

“How did they have time to homeschool you?” Erin blurted.

Holtz snorted. “They didn’t. My grandparents did.”

“Oh,” was Erin’s response. Then in a much smaller voice: “You—you said _was_. Are your parents—”

“Happily retired? Sure are.”

Erin’s shoulders sagged with visible relief. “Good. That’s good.” She hesitated. “I—I didn’t know. Um, about them. You’ve never talked about them.”

“You’ve never asked.”

“That’s…true I guess.” Erin stared blankly at the TV, fidgeting with her hands. “Were they really…?”

Holtz elbowed her. “Maybe next time you’ll think twice before arguing with me about time travel, eh?”

Erin gave her a look that was one part annoyance, one part fondness, all parts Erin.

-

“What’s your second middle name?” Erin asked between episodes.

Holtz stared straight ahead, mouth twisting. “Henry.”

“It is _not_.”

“Sure is.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“It is!”

“You’re lying.”

“My parents always wanted to have a bunch of kids, but I was so much work that they called it quits after me and gave me all the names they were saving. That’s why I have so many.”

“Soooo much work, huh? You must have been a real handful as a kid.”

“No.” Holtz glanced at her. “I mean, yeah—I was, hundred percent—but that’s not what I meant. IVF is super taxing and crazy expensive, so after they spent years going through it the first time, that was pretty much all she wrote. No more kids after that.”

“Wait, you were—”

“Created in a test tube? Hell yeah—you surprised?”

“Not even a little bit,” Erin replied resolutely.

Holtz chuckled.

“Jillian Susan Henry Something Holtzmann,” Erin murmured softly. “Your parents must have wanted you so badly.” There was something sad, wistful, in her voice.

Holtz found her hand and squeezed it, not saying anything.

-

They were watching a particularly high-stakes episode. Holtz couldn’t quite recall the plot enough to remember how it turned out, so she was figuratively on the edge of her seat.

And in a literal sense, she had scooched a few inches closer to the TV, her knees pulled up to her chest and her arms wrapped loosely around them, completely enrapt by what was happening on the screen.

She was not _so_ enrapt, however, that she didn’t take notice when all of a sudden Erin’s hand rested warm and solid on her lower back.

Holtz had a mouthful of Sour Patch Kids. Her chewing slowed. She resisted the urge to look over her shoulder.

Because the thing about Erin, the thing that made her different from Holtz, was that she didn’t do a single thing without thinking it through. Twice. And then a third time for good measure. Everything she did was analyzed, deliberated, looked at from all angles. Arranged into columns on either side of a pros and cons list.

(Holtz hated lists).

The contact felt casual, but Erin Gilbert was not a casual person. The casual was elaborately constructed, calculated, planned. It was not a natural casual. This casual was not of this earth.

Holtz sped up her chewing again all before Erin could notice the pause. She did not react, did not make a witty comment or flirtatious quip, did not wink, did not pass go, did not collect $200.

The episode wrapped up. Another one began.

Her muscles ached to lounge back against the couch or lie down in amongst the blanket nest.

She did not.

-

Erin Gilbert was not afraid of no ghosts.

That didn’t mean she wasn’t easily spooked.

-

“I should probably get going,” Erin said. Her hand disappeared from Holtz’s back and she stretched her arms overhead, fingertips brushing the roof of the fort. “It’s pretty late.”

Holtz had lost track of how many episodes they’d watched. She moved for the first time in hours, rolling her neck from side to side and listening to it crack. “Is it?”

“Nearly 11:00.”

“That’s not late.”

“It is for me,” Erin said. She smiled, soft in the dim light. “This was fun, though.”

Holtz folded her arms behind her head and leaned back. “I’m gonna sleep here,” she declared.

Erin clucked her tongue. “The Fuzzies will miss you.”

“They’ll survive. Mama’s comfy.” As if to prove her point, Holtz let her eyes drift shut.

A long pause, and then, unexpectedly, a soft press of lips to her temple.

“Night, Holtz.”

“Night, Erin,” Holtz replied, voice remarkably even.

A rustling, and then she was alone in the fort.

She cracked an eye open and smiled to herself.

-

“Where the hell do you expect me to eat my breakfast?”

Holtz leaned up against the back of the couch with a grin. “Morning, Patty.”

“Patty needs a minimum two coffees and half an hour alone to watch the news before she can deal with your crazy ass.”

Holtz gestured behind her. “You can do that in there.”

“Oh hell no, I ain’t setting foot in there and getting myself blown up.”

“Nuclear pillow fort,” Holtz said contemplatively, stroking her chin. “Now _there’s_ an idea.”

“Take it down. Now.”

“Only for you, Patricia,” Holtz replied lovingly.

-

Taking it down wasn’t nearly as fun as putting it up.

(Or taking it down the first time).

-

_47) Build a fort in the workplace_

-

“Hello?”

“Erin—I need you. Come quick. It’s an emergency.”

“Wh—Holtz? What’s going on? Are you okay?”

“No time to explain. Come as fast as you can. Bring cookies.”

She hung up before Erin could respond.

-

It was an impressively short amount of time later when Holtz’s phone rang.

“Yello?”

“Oh thank god. I was about two seconds away from breaking down the door.”

Holtz blinked. “It’s unlocked.”

“Trust me, it isn’t.”

“Mmmmmm pretty sure it’s unlocked.”

“Holtz, do you think I would have spent the last five minutes pounding on the door if it was unlocked?”

Holtz sat up straighter. “You’ve been knocking?”

“I think everyone on the block has heard me knocking.”

A pause. “Erin…where are you?”

“Outside your door—you weren’t answering your buzzer and I was about to call when someone let me into the building.”

Another pause.

“Am I—at the right apartment?” Erin asked. “It’s 424, right?”

“Right, so, it appears there may have been a slight miscommunication.”

Now Erin paused.

“Wait. No. _No_. _Holtzmann_ —”

“I didn’t think it needed to be said—”

“Of course it needed to be said! Oh my _god!_ You’re at the _firehouse?_ ”

“Of course I’m at the firehouse! Why would I be at home?”

“ _It’s 3:00am_ ,” Erin said in something that resembled a screech.

“It is?”

“Oh my god, I’m going home. I can’t believe you woke me up and made me schlep across town and then gave me a heart attack when you wouldn’t open the door because I thought you were _injured_ or _dead_ and—”

“Whose to say I’m not?”

“ _Are you?_ ”

“No,” Holtz admitted. “But it’s still an emergency.”

“I am not coming all the way to the firehouse. I’m going home and going back to bed.”

“You’re already out!”

“Yes, in the compete opposite direction!” Erin sighed. “Look, I’m exhausted, I’m—”

“I neeeed you.”

One last pause, and then a gruff, “Fine. I’ll be there soon.”

“You’rethebeeeesssst.”

-

“I can’t _believe_ you leave the firehouse doors unlocked.”

It was usually Holtz who snuck up on Erin, but this time it was Holtz who leapt half a foot in the air and dropped what was in her hand with a probably-not-fatal clang. “When did you get here?”

“Two seconds ago, through the _unlocked door_ , oh my _god_. What if I’d been a murderer, Holtzmann? Huh?”

“Then I would have detonated the emergency intruder system,” Holtz said calmly. “And you’d be dead.”

“You can’t just leave the door unlocked.”

“I was _here!_ I lock it when I leave for the niiight,” Holtz whined.

“Right, yeah, and you’re so observant. Somebody could walk in, steal everything downstairs, and walk right out all without you knowing.”

Holtz twirled a wrench. “Probably true.”

Erin dropped the massive bag hanging from her shoulder onto the floor with a heavy thunk. “So what’s the emergency?”

“I’m in the middle of something I can’t leave, and I got hungry,” Holtz said. She wriggled her fingers at the bag. “Are those my cookies?”

Erin’s mouth fell open. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Holtz dropped her wrench. “You swore!”

“You _woke me up at 3:00am_ because you were _hungry?!_ ”

“To be fair, it was only two when I called. Not my fault you went to the wrong address.”

“I’m going to kill you. I’m actually going to kill you.”

“Noted. Before you do, mind handing me the cookies? Last meal, and all?”

“There’s no cookies.”

Holtz gasped and clutched her chest.

“I didn’t have cookies,” Erin grumbled. “I panicked, I…”

Holtz stepped closer and peered into the bag on the floor. Peeking out the top was a set of matching glass containers, neatly labeled _FLOUR_ and _SUGAR_.

“Errriiiin,” Holtz sang, “did you…bring _ingredients to make cookies?_ ”

“No.” Erin’s face was red. “Shut up.”

“I told you it was an emergency, asked you to bring cookies, and you brought _ingredients to make cookies_.”

“What kind of emergency needs cookies anyway?” Erin threw her hands up. “I thought you were injured or something! And wanted snack food. I don’t know!”

“Right, so you brought _ingredients to make cookies_ instead of cookies.”

“Shut _up_ ,” Erin repeated. “I panicked, okay! _It’s the middle of the night!_ ”

“Sure, sure, sure.”

“I was _asleep_ when you called.”

“Yep, yep, yep.”

“I hate you so much.” Erin collapsed into her desk chair. “No thank you or anything.”

“Erin,” Holtz said solemnly, “you have made me happier than I ever thought possible. Thank you for coming to my rescue. Even if you didn’t bring cookies.”

Erin groaned, but halfway through it turned into a yawn.

“What are you working on anyway? That you can’t leave?”

“Oh, this?” Holtz pushed her goggles up onto her forehead. “I got inspired by our Doctor Who conversation the other night.”

Erin eyed her warily. “You’re not trying to invent time travel, are you?”

“Funny you should mention that! So you remember that one episode we watched, the one with Rosa Parks? That gave me an idea—”

“What, you want to travel back in time to meet her?”

“Oh, absolutely, wouldn’t you? But no—it gave me the idea to build a temporal displacement weapon.”

Erin stared.

“That’s…impossible,” she mumbled. “What would you even…do with it?”

“Picture this. We’re face-to-face with a ghost, engaged in general fisticuffs, when BAM!”

Erin jumped.

“I send that baby right back to whence it came!” Holtz mimed blowing on a weapon.

“Sending it…back in time?”

“Back in time, back to when it died. _Ooh_ yeah.”

“But—but temporal displacement doesn’t make any sense for a ghost. They’re functionally immortal—they—” Erin broke off with a nervous laugh. “You’re just messing with me, right? That’s not what you’re building. You’re building a gun or something.”

“I mean technically it is a gun or something,” Holtz said, holding it up.

Erin blinked at her. “If you were to send a ghost back in time, it would just live out all the time in between, haunting that location, until the present day, where it would—” She shook her head to herself, face scrunching up. “It would—it would still be there. The place where you banished it from—or banished it to—or—would it even _go?_ Would it just…stay? What—” Her frown deepened.

Holtz grinned. “Ex- _actly_.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Erin said. “The logic just doesn’t—”

“It’s a…” Holtz trailed off, eyebrows raised, waiting for Erin to get it.

“Paradox,” Erin filled in.

“Bingo.”

“You’re trying to create a paradox on purpose?” Erin laughed again. “That would tear a hole in the universe every time you did it.”

“Right.”

“Wait, that’s your _goal?_ ”

“Holtzy tears a hole—ghostie gets sucked right out.”

Erin’s face screwed up so far into itself that it looked painful. “Excuse me, _what?_ ”

“We should go make cookies,” Holtz said. “Would you believe that I’ve never made cookies before? I could actually squeeze in a Mop Log entry by sunrise.”

“No, no, don’t distract me, can we get back to you intentionally tearing holes in the universe? Because oh my gosh Holtzmann, you can’t just—wait, did you just say that you’ve never made _cookies?_ ”

“Mmmmnope.”

“You mean to tell me that for your first foray into baking, you chose to make _all the pies_ when we could have started with a simple _cookie?_ ”

“I didn’t want cookies then,” Holtz said. “I wanted all the pies.”

“You’re unbelievable.”

“You better believe it, baby.” Holtz shimmied her shoulders. “C’mon. Let’s go bake cookies—we can argue about temporal displacement tomorrow.”

“No. I should go home. Go back to sleep.”

“Come onnnn. You already lugged all that across town. Twice. Might as well make some cookies, hm?”

Erin let out a small, defeated sigh.

“Fine.”

-

Nobody had ever attempted to cook, or bake, in the firehouse kitchen. As such, it was about as well-stocked as a standard office kitchen might be—plates, bowls, mugs, cups, cutlery.

In short, it kind of lacked the basic equipment needed for baking.

Holtz held a finger up. “Start preheating the oven. Give me five minutes.”

-

She slammed the large metal mixing bowl down on the table, where Erin appeared to be falling asleep sitting down. She jumped, eyes flying open.

“Did you just make that?” She ran her finger along the smooth aluminum. “Impressive craftsmanship.”

“We call that Holtzmannship.”

Erin laughed.

-

“I don’t suppose you could make some measuring cups as easily,” Erin said with a sigh as she opened the flour container.

“Hmm. Probably not.” Holtz perked up. “I have a scale down in the lab, though—would that work?”

“That’s actually even better—measuring by weight is more accurate in baking anyway.”

“Brilliant. BRB.”

Holtz ran down the stairs again.

-

Erin stared. And stared some more.

“I…I assumed you meant a digital scale, Holtz. Not—I mean, it’s beautiful, but—”

“It’s my alchemy scale!”

Erin bent over the brass scale. “Where did you even _get_ this? A dumpster?”

“Auction.”

Erin gave her a suspicious look but tipped the scales with her index finger. “Do you have the weights that go with it?”

“Uhhhh…I did. But then I ran out of scrap one day and melted them down out of desperation. Pretty sure they’re in part of your proton pack.”

“Helpful.” Erin straightened up. “Well, never mind. We can just eyeball things instead of measuring. I know what a cup looks like.”

“See, normally I’d be all for winging it, because that’s the exact kind of reckless abandonment of the scientific method that I’m always encouraging you to partake in, buuuutttt…what’s the challenge in that? Wouldn’t it be so much more fun to use these?”

“How?”

“Well, I happen to know off the top of my head the weight of steel per cubic inch. Or copper. Or aluminum. Or tungsten. Or literally anything else I have in the lab downstairs. I reckon you could whip up a few calculations faster than I could collect some, and we could figure out how much we’d need to balance a cup of whatever.” She pointed at the ingredients lining the counter. “We weigh it out, presto-chango, we’ve got ourselves some cookies. Whaddya say?”

-

It took 2.769 cubic inches of steel’s worth of flour to make cookies.

-

“That,” Erin said, breaking a cookie in half, “was _the_ most absurd way anyone has ever made cookies.”

“I think the phrase you’re looking for is ‘delightfully nerdy.’”

They clinked their cookies together in a cheers.

Erin leaned back in her chair.

“Don’t think I haven’t forgotten that you’re trying to send ghosts back in time.”

Holtz cackled.

_48) Bake cookies_

-

The firehouse was alive with the sound of music.

There were footsteps on the stairs.

“Holtz? I, um, have a message from Patty—”

Holtz didn’t turn. “Is it _shut the fuck up?_ ”

A pause. “Yes.”

“Nice of her to send you.”

“She actually already yelled it up the stairs. Three times.”

“I heard her,” Holtz said cheerfully. She pounded on the electric keyboard in front of her.

“I take it you’re trying to learn piano?”

“Sure am.”

“This reminds me of when you tried to learn how to knit on your own…except it’s so much worse.”

Holtz bobbed her head as she continued to rock out on the keys.

“Can you at least turn down the—okay, stop, _stop_ , I can’t listen to this anymore. Move over.”

Holtz stopped playing and looked over her shoulder with interest. She scooted over on the little bench, which threatened to collapse under their combined weight when Erin sat down beside her.

“I’m going to teach you a basic scale,” Erin murmured, pushing Holtz’s hands off the keyboard and replacing them with her own.

“Scales are boring,” Holtz said.

“You’ve got to walk before you can run,” Erin countered. “This is the C major scale. I’ll call out the notes as I play them.” Her hand settled on the keyboard, then began to move, one key at a time, slow. “C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, B, A, G, F, E, D, C.”

“Why the hell are they all out of order?”

“They’re not.” Erin grabbed Holtz’s right hand and set it down where hers had been. “It starts with what’s called _middle C_. That one.” She pressed Holtz’s thumb down over the key.

“How do you know which one is middle C?”

“It’s in the middle,” Erin said dismissively. “Okay, give it a shot. C…D…E…yes, that’s right, now bring your thumb underneath to get the next note…”

“What?”

Erin demonstrated again an octave down. “C, D, E—thumb comes under—F…”

“Okay, okay, I got it. Wait…I lost middle C.”

Erin bit her lip. “Umm…okay, I have an idea. Wait here.”

She picked herself up off the bench and ran to the kitchen—Holtz was set up on the third floor, because she didn’t think the lab could handle any more electronics plugged in.

She came back a second later with the little magnetic dry erase marker from the whiteboard on the fridge where they left reminders and notes of encouragement to each other.

She uncapped it and carefully wrote out neat little letters on all the white keys, then capped it again and balanced it on the upper part of the keyboard. 

“There you go,” she said. “That should help you get your bearings. I also put a dot on middle C for you.”

Holtz regarded it. “It’s not even in the middle.”

“It’s…well, it’s the C closest to the middle. Whatever. Come on—try the scale again.”

“I still don’t get why it starts with C. Why doesn’t it start with A?”

“Because it’s the C major scale,” Erin said.

“Oh. Okay, that checks out.” Holtz lined her hand up again, slowly attempting the scale while Erin called out the notes. As neurotic as Erin’s labeling was, it did help, but her fingers still tripped over each other.

“Here, watch me again.” Erin nudged Holtz’s hand off the keyboard. She demonstrated the scale again with classic Erin Gilbert elegance. Then her left hand joined her right, moving up the keyboard simultaneously. They broke apart, traveling in opposite directions, then came back together, then descended back down to where they’d started.

“Now you’re just showing off,” Holtz teased.

“These are still scales,” Erin said. “It’s…really nothing fancy.” She cleared her throat. “I did piano lessons for eight years.”

Holtz leaned forward, elbows coming down on the keys with a cacophony of notes that made Erin cringe, and rested her chin on her hands. “Play me a song, Gilbert.”

“You’re going to break the keys doing that.”

Holtz picked herself up off the keyboard. “Come on. Play me something.”

Erin hesitated. “Learn the scale first,” she said, all smug, “and then we’ll see.”

-

Piano playing. Add it to the score of things that Erin Gilbert’s fingers were exceptionally good at.

They moved so fast, so gracefully over the keys. It was kind of magnificent to watch.

Holtz leaned her head against Erin’s shoulder as she played, letting the music wash over her.

When the song ended, there were a few seconds of silence, and then Erin coughed.

“I’m a little rusty.”

“You’re amazing,” Holtz said resolutely. “Play me another?”

A soft laugh. “Sure, Holtz.”

_49) Learn piano_

-

Holtz was up to her neck in chicken wire.

The chinchilla cage project had stretched out longer than anticipated. Weeks longer. Mostly because she kept getting ideas for additions, and it kept getting more and more elaborate. Only the best for her babies.

She ambled out of the Fuzzies’ room, covered in sawdust from cutting shelves, and nursing a bloodied thumb from a moment where she’d gotten too excitable. She’d been at it for hours anyway—was probably due for a break and a beer.

The lights were off in the living room, but there was just enough light from the flickering TV for her to make out the scene in front of her: Erin, stretched out on the couch, with no fewer than four Fuzzies and the cat all cuddled up on her torso.

Because Holtz did _not_ keep her system sound on, she was able to snap a quick photo with her phone unnoticed before she leaned on the back of the couch. “If I’d known you were going to desecrate my apartment with trashy reality TV, I wouldn’t have bothered carrying that two blocks, on the subway, another block, and up three flights of stairs for you.”

Erin looked up with surprise, then back at the cracked screen that she’d been so captivated by that she hadn’t noticed her approaching. “I didn’t ask you to do that.”

“Mmmm, I _distinctly_ recall you begging me on hands and knees at least ten times to get you a TV.”

“There were no hands and knees,” Erin said.

“Okaaaay.” Holtz reached to pet whichever fluffy fur was closest, then skipped off to the kitchen.

She returned with a beer a minute later, lifting Erin’s feet so she could flop down at the end of the couch, then replacing them on her lap. She took a long drink, then felt Erin’s eyes on her.

“Really? Didn’t get one for me too?”

“Sorry, figured you were probably leaving soon. Isn’t it late, or whatever?”

“There’s still half this episode left.”

“Alrighty then. Here, you take this one. I’ll get myself another.” Holtz passed the beer bottle to Erin, who took it and went to take a sip, then froze.

“Holtz—oh my gosh, there’s blood on this. Are you bleeding?”

“Lil bit.” Holtz slid out from under Erin’s feet.

“That’s so unsanitary.”

“I’m fine, thanks for asking,” Holtz teased, dancing away from the couch.

“Bring a wet paper towel,” Erin called.

Holtz obliged, after making a pit stop in the bathroom to wash her hand off. She dropped back onto the couch with a new beer and handed Erin the requested paper towel, watching her wipe down the bottle with it before tossing it on the coffee table.

Holtz pointed. “ _That’s_ unsanitary.”

Erin rolled her eyes. “I’ll get it later. Did you clean yourself up?”

Holtz held out her hand so Erin could see the three bandaids she’d applied because she couldn’t pick between them. One Spiderman, one Snoopy, and one Scooby Doo. She was in an S mood. “Kiss it better?”

Another eye roll, but Erin caught her hand and pressed a brief kiss to the bandaids. Then, instead of letting it go, she interlaced their fingers.

One of the Fuzzies crawled into Holtz’s lap, and she settled back against the couch, and took a sip of her beer, and suffered through an episode and a half of reality-TV swill all while Erin hung onto her for dear life.

-

It wasn’t really suffering.


	5. Chapter 5

“We should go to the Grand Canyon.”

Erin made a noise of confirmation without looking up from her work. “It’s beautiful.”

Holtz jangled the Ecto keys.

Erin’s head snapped up, gaze locking in on the keys in Holtz’s hand. “No. No, no, _no_ , absolutely _not_. Are you _crazy?_ ”

Holtz deflated, but didn’t let it show.

Erin continued her mini rant. “We’re not _driving_ to _Arizona_ , are you kidding me? Gosh.” She rolled her eyes and turned back to her laptop screen.

Holtz started to slink away as Erin resumed typing, clicking away at the keys.

“I’m looking at flights,” Erin said, distracted-sounding as she squinted at the screen. “Were you set on leaving today, or can we go tomorrow and save $78?”

Holtz turned back with a grin.

When she didn’t respond, Erin looked up and cocked her head. “Holtz?”

“We can go tomorrow,” Holtz confirmed.

-

“Now _this_ ,” Erin said as they walked up to the ledge, “is what bucket lists are made of—oh, don’t give me that look, we’ve been doing this for five months, I _know_ it’s not a bucket list. I was just saying.”

“It’s been five months?” Holtz asked with glee.

“Nearly,” Erin said, shielding her eyes from the sun. “It was early April when we started this whole thing. The, um…fifth, I think.”

“Wow. Feels like it was just yesterday. Or, like, 29 days ago.”

“That’s a very specific number.” Erin grabbed her arm and pulled Holtz back a few steps. “Watch it. You’re not getting any closer to that edge, you hear me?”

“I won’t fall.”

“You might. And that would ruin a beautiful view, so I suggest you don’t.”

Holtz rocked back on her heels with a grin. “Roger that.”

They stood in silence for a moment, just admiring the view. Erin was still holding onto her arm.

“It’s not as big as I remember it,” Holtz said.

In one swift motion, Erin let go of her arm and stepped away from her, mouth falling open. “Wait, are—have you—did you— _Holtz!”_

“Yeeeesss?”

“You’ve _been here before?!”_

“Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh yeah?”

“This is so much worse than the library! Oh my _god._ Are you _kidding me?”_

“If you think back, you’ll recall that I never actually said that I hadn’t been here before.”

“It was _implied._ ”

“Mmm, I think you just assumed this was for the Mop Log when in fact I never said any such thing.”

“Of course I assumed it was for the Mop Log! Everything is always for the Mop Log! Why the heck are we here otherwise?”

Holtz gestured at the vast canyon in front of them. “To take in the beautiful view? Which, might I add, is kind of being ruined by all this jabbering. You should consider quieting down—you’re disturbing the peace.”

“Oh, I’m disturbing the peace, am I?” Erin giggled and gave her a little shove.

“Whoa—whoa—whoa!” Holtz windmilled her arms like she was going to fall, even though they were a solid ten feet from the edge and on very stable ground.

Erin caught her arm again anyway. “Don’t do that. You’re going to fall for real.”

“You’re the one who pushed me.”

“Only because you’re insufferable.”

“Ehhh, I don’t think that’ll hold up in court.”

“It’s a big canyon,” Erin said. “People fall in it all the time. We’ve got no witnesses.”

“ _All the time_ seems like an exaggeration.”

Erin shrugged. “The odds of death at the Grand Canyon are one in 400,000 visitors.”

“How do you…know that? Now I’m starting to think you really _have_ brought me here to push me into the canyon. I wouldn’t have really pegged you as a ‘murder by canyon’ type of gal, but I’m impressed by your dedication.”

“Okay, _one_ —” Erin held up a finger— “you brought _me_ here, not the other way around. _Two_ , if I was going to fabricate an ‘accident’ to kill you, obviously I’d do it in the lab—why go so far from home? And _three_ , you’re more likely to die of dehydration or heatstroke out here than by falling.”

“So you’ve locked my water bottle in the car,” Holtz deadpanned.

Erin snorted. “You’ve got the keys. No, I dumped it out when you had your back turned.”

“Man, I love it when Erin Gilbert’s morbid sense of humour comes out to play,” Holtz said. “Makes me feel like I’ve finally met my match.”

“We bust ghosts for a living, Holtz,” Erin said, walking backwards towards the car with a shrug and a smile. “ _Morbid_ is pretty much written into our job descriptions.”

Holtz skipped after her, making proton gun noises.

-

“Can I ask you a question?”

They were sitting on the hood of the rental car, feet dangling above the dust.

Holtz glanced at Erin and took a swig from her water bottle, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “Always. Unless it’s a boring question, in which case I reserve the right to not answer it.”

Erin was chewing on her lip and avoiding her gaze. She opened and closed her mouth a few times, then looked up, searching Holtz’s face for a long, drawn-out moment. Something flickered behind her eyes.

“Tell me about the first time you came here,” she blurted.

Holtz quirked an eyebrow. “That’s not a question.”

“Tell me about the first time you came here?” Erin tried again, turning the inflection at the end into a question.

Holtz would have bet one of her shinier patents and a good cheesesteak that that wasn’t the question Erin wanted to ask, but she rolled with it.

“I was 18,” she said, setting the water bottle down on the hood next to her folded-up glasses. “Was in the neighbourhood, thought I’d come see what all the fuss was about.”

“In the neighbourhood?”

“Snooping around Area 51,” Holtz clarified.

Erin snorted. “Wow.”

Holtz leaned back onto her elbows. “Have I ever told you that I’m on a number of government watch lists?”

“I know, Holtz. Homeland Security took us aside to warn us one time while you were out dumpster diving.”

It was Holtz’s turn to snort.

“Of course, Abby had some choice words that I’m pretty sure landed the rest of us on one as well,” Erin added contemplatively. She shrugged and crossed her legs. “But what are you gonna do?”

Holtz chuckled softly.

“So you came by yourself, then?” Erin said casually a minute later.

“Hm? Oh.” Holtz gazed out at the canyon. “Yeah. Yeah, I was alone.”

It was quiet. Holtz looked up to see Erin watching her.

“It’s better with you,” she promised.

Erin smiled at that, then was back to chewing on her lip again. She inhaled a rattly breath. “Can I ask you another question?”

“Second time’s the charm.”

Erin laughed shakily. She wrung her hands.

There was a long beat.

“Why do you hate your first name so much?”

Holtz gazed at her. “Was that the question you wanted to ask?”

“No,” Erin admitted, “but I have wondered for a while.”

Holtz picked herself up from her reclined position, managing to knock her glasses off the car as she did so. Erin, with her ever-quick reflexes, snagged them before they could hit the ground and break. She handed them to Holtz, who took them with an appreciate nod and jammed them on top of her head out of harm’s way.

“It’s verging on a boring question, but I’ll give it to you anyway because my answer’s bound to be just as boring.” She swung her legs. “I don’t have any sort of interesting reason. Just don’t like it.”

“You’re right, that is a boring answer.”

“I can make up a story, if you want. Witness protection told me I couldn’t go by that name anymore? I have an ex with that name? I sold it on the black market in exchange for parts? I—”

“Okay, okay, forget I asked,” Erin said with a laugh. “You don’t need a reason. It just strikes me as funny that your parents gave you four names only for you to choose to go by your surname.”

Holtz thought for a moment.

“Well, I suppose— _if_ you swear to _never_ do so in front of the others—”

Erin perked up with interest.

“—you can call me Henry.”

Erin burst out laughing. It echoed down into the canyon. “Not Susan?” she said through helpless giggles.

“Take it or leave it,” Holtz said with a wide grin.

Erin’s laughter petered out. She bumped her shoulder to Holtz’s and bit back a smile.

“I think I’ll stick with _Holtz_.”

“Atta girl.”

-

“Can I ask another question?”

They were on the plane home. Holtz peeled her gaze away from the little window that she was watching clouds out of.

“What part of _always_ didya not understand, Gilbert?”

Erin hesitated anyway.

“Have you stopped trying to find something for the Mop Log that I haven’t done?”

“Definitely not,” Holtz said right away. “I am _fully_ committed to finding something. Don’t you worry.” She paused, scratching her neck. “Although, I do think I’ve been trying too hard. I’m gonna sit back a little for a while and see what happens. I think when I find it, I’m gonna find it naturally. Not by thinking myself to death.”

“Heaven forbid you think too much,” Erin teased.

“I’ll find something,” Holtz warned. “I promise.”

“I’m sure you will,” Erin said, giving her a reassuring pat on the thigh. “You want to watch a movie? We can start them at the same time.” She gestured at the tiny TVs embedded in the seats in front of them.

“Hell yeah,” Holtz replied.

Erin let her pick, which is how they ended up pushing play simultaneously on a newly released animated children’s movie, their respective screens showing the same intro sequence as they settled back into their chairs, each with one earbud in so they could still talk.

Erin’s hand found Holtz’s thigh again, a warm and comforting weight, and remained there for the rest of the flight.

-

Holtz was pretty sure that still wasn’t the question Erin wanted to ask.

-

Jillian Holtzmann was not in the habit of writing scholarly papers. In fact, she was fairly certain she’d not done so since her school years.

But when she _had_ written papers, she always wrote the conclusion first.

Conclusion first, and then later she’d figure out how she’d gotten there.

-

She also knew that most people needed to write in chronological order. To reach their conclusion by methodically passing from point A to point B.

To take the long way round.

-

There was an incessant pounding at Holtz’s door.

She stumbled across her apartment, rubbing her eyes, and unlocked it and threw it open.

She blinked. “Erin? Whatcha doing here?”

Erin yelped and covered her eyes. “ _Holtz—_ you’re—you’re not wearing a shirt.”

“I was asleep,” Holtz said.

“What do you mean, _asleep?_ It’s nearly 11:00am!”

“Was at the lab until like two o’clock finishing something up.” Holtz yawned, then zeroed in on the grocery bags littered around Erin’s feet. “What’s all that?”

“Can—can you go put a shirt on so I can come inside?”

“Well, you could just—”

_“Shirt_ ,” Erin said emphatically. “Please.”

“Alriiight, prude,” Holtz said. She darted back into the apartment and snagged the first top she found on her bedroom floor, hurriedly yanking it down over her head. When she stepped back out into the living room, she saw that Erin had already let herself into the apartment.

“I’m not a prude,” she was mumbling, arms full of her grocery bags as she nudged the door shut behind her with her foot. “You just caught me off guard. Do you always answer the door topless?”

Holtz leaned on the back of her couch. “If I’m topless when someone knocks.”

Erin shot her a look.

“Hey, it’s summer,” Holtz said, holding up her hands.

“It’s September.”

“You should just be glad I’m wearing pants.”

Erin eyed her boxers. “Barely,” she said, then disappeared into the kitchen. “What if I’d been your landlord?”

“Then I would’ve made his day,” Holtz said. She picked herself up and trailed Erin into the kitchen just in time to watch her set the bags down on the counter. “So, what gives? You movin’ in or something?”

Erin turned to face her, cheeks just barely pink. She bit her lip. “I was wondering if…you maybe wanted to hang out today?”

Holtz leaned against the counter. “We never hang out on Saturdays.”

“I know, you…usually spend the whole weekend at the lab, but I thought maybe—”

“You know I do that?”

“You’re not subtle,” Erin said.

“Do Abby and Patty know I do that?”

“Probably not,” Erin admitted. “Anyway, I know that you’d probably rather—”

“I’d love to hang out with you today,” Holtz said.

Erin faltered. “Yeah?”

“Abso- _lutely_. Did you just want to hang around here? Or did you have something in particular you wanted to go do?”

“I have a few ideas,” Erin said casually. “And I thought tonight maybe we could make dinner?” She gestured at the bags.

Holtz quirked an eyebrow. “ _Make_ as in _cook?_ You want to _cook?_ I’ve never cooked a meal in my life.”

“There’s more to life than takeout, Holtz,” Erin teased.

“Unsubstantiated,” Holtz replied in her best Erin impression.

Erin laughed.

-

Erin took them all over the city and beyond. They went to Mmuseumm and had a private tour of the exhibits, which were the exact balance between strange and thought-provoking that Holtz looked for in a museum. They caught a performance by an offbeat queer theatre troupe who exclusively performed Shakespeare on subway trains. They visited a cat sanctuary on Roosevelt Island. They ate lunch at the most decrepit hole-in-the-wall that Holtz had ever seen, so gross that she looked at Erin in surprise when she led her there, only to be wowed by the best food she’d eaten in months.

After lunch there was an ice cream cart, from which Erin bought herself one of those little cups of chocolate ice cream with the peel-back paper lid and tiny wooden spoon, and bought Holtz a horrifyingly inaccurate Spongebob popsicle that sported a third eye. It was awesome.

Then Erin dragged them out to Queens.

“Two museums in one day?” Holtz asked when she saw where they were.

“You’ll see,” Erin replied.

-

They stood overlooking the _Panorama of the City of New York_ —a massive, full-scale replica of their home in miniature. Nearly 10,000 square feet. It was incredible.

Holtz pointed. “Look, I can see the firehouse!”

Erin laughed. “No you can’t.”

“Sure can. I have spectacular vision.”

Erin’s laugh softened into a smile. “I, um, actually have something for you. On that topic.” She reached into her purse and produced a piece of paper, which she handed to Holtz.

Holtz pushed her glasses up onto her head to get a better look. She read over the page, a smile erupting on her face when she realized what it was.

“You can actually adopt buildings,” Erin said casually. “By donation.”

Holtz looked up from the deed baring her name, grin widening. “You bought the firehouse for me. I’m touched, Gilbs.”

Erin bit her lip. “It’s a little silly, but…”

“I love it. So much.” Holtz hugged the deed to her chest. “I’m surprised nobody else had snapped it up yet.”

Erin cleared her throat. “Well…”

“Had they?”

“It’s possible I had to buy it off someone. For a considerably larger donation than the original one. And a few autographs.” She laughed nervously. “But now it’s yours.”

“Ours,” Holtz corrected. She tapped the paper. “You need to put your name on this deed too.”

Erin bit her lip again, smiling. “Okay.”

-

After the museum, they went to a pet store. Erin wanted to buy some gifts for the Fuzzies and Topsoil. She loaded up a basket with treats and toys while Holtz watched her, a little fascinated.

Then they wandered the back of the store, checking out the tanks and cages of small adoptables. Birds, reptiles, rodents, fish…

“Can we get a fish?”

“That…seems like a bad idea,” Erin said. “Where would we…keep it?”

“Hmm.” Holtz tapped her chin. “You’re right—it would turn radioactive if we put it in the lab. Third floor?”

“Oh…you meant for the firehouse?”

“Yeah, our own lil firehouse fishy—what, did you think I was suggesting we adopt a fish together? Coparent? Joint custody, weekdays at my place, weekends and holidays at yours?” Holtz grinned.

“Alright, shush,” Erin said, walking away, the tips of her ears pink.

“You didn’t answer—can we get a fish?” Holtz called after her.

“Fine,” Erin called back, “but not today.”

That was good enough for Holtz. She skipped after her.

-

Holtz rolled up her sleeves and leaned against the counter. “So what are we cooking?”

Erin was taking ingredients out of the fridge. “I thought, um, maybe pan-fried salmon with crispy potatoes, burst tomatoes, and green beans?”

“That sounds fancy.”

“It’s not. Really not. It’s pretty basic, actually.”

“I’ll be the judge of that.” Holtz paused. “Now, when you say ‘pan-fried,’ that wouldn’t happen to require a frying pan, would it?”

Erin looked at her, eyes wide. “Oh, shoot. I totally forgot that your kitchen supplies are…lacking.” Her eyes drifted over the ingredients on the counter. “Okay. That’s fine. We can poach the salmon instead. No big deal.”

“You can poach things besides eggs?”

“Yes.” Erin continued surveying the ingredients. “Wait, do you have a sheet tray? Like a cookie sheet?”

“You were with me when I bought everything in this kitchen, Er.”

“Dang it,” Erin said softly.

“Too bad I didn’t know you were coming, or I would’ve nicked the one at the firehouse that I made.” It was far easier to make than the mixing bowl had been. The hardest part was just selecting the right kind of metal.

“Or we could have just bought one while we were out, if I’d been thinking.”

“Or that.”

Erin stood there for a moment, chewing on her lip. “We didn’t use all the pie shells, right?”

Before Holtz could answer, Erin had flung the freezer door open to reveal a completely empty freezer except for two frozen pie shell boxes stacked one on top of the other.

“Are we gonna make a salmon-potato-green bean-tomato pie?” Holtz asked. “Because, uh…”

Erin tore open one of the boxes, sliding the shell out. She grabbed a butter knife from one of the drawers and carefully slotted it between the crust and the tin, using it to pry it up. She repeated this a few more times from other vantage points around the circumference before the crust loosened and released from the tin. They’d done the same thing when it had come time to bake their apple pie—replacing the store-bought crust with their homemade one but recycling the tin.

Erin set the crust on top of the box and brandished the now-empty tin with a proud grin. “Voila! An admittedly small but totally functional roasting pan!”

“You’re brilliant, Erin.”

Erin blushed under the compliment. “Do the other one—I’ll give this one a wash.”

“Yes ma’am.”

-

“What do you need me to do?” Holtz asked.

“Uhh, do you want to trim the green beans?”

“Trim,” Holtz repeated. “Like…give a haircut to?”

Erin snorted. “Cut the end off.”

Holtz picked up one of the beans from the stack of paper towels where they’d been drying after Erin washed them. She examined it. “Which end?”

“Both ends.”

“You got it.” Holtz set the bean down on the cutting board in front of her and whipped her Swiss Army knife out of her pocket. She set to work sawing off the tips with the small blade.

Erin glanced over. “Do you own scissors? They’re actually faster—you can snip them off pretty easily.”

“On it.” Holtz made a big show of folding the blade back into the knife and swapping it out for the teeny tiny scissors attachment instead.

“No, I meant—”

Holtz snipped the end off of the next bean with the microscopic spring-loaded scissors. “You’re right—this is much faster.”

When she didn’t get the laugh she was anticipating, she looked up. Erin was watching her with a distinctly odd expression—kind of indescribable, really—and a smile.

“What?”

Erin shook her head and her face morphed into a serious expression. She dug her own Swiss Army knife out of her pocket and brandished it. “Not as fast as it will be with two.”

Holtz wiggled her fingers at it. “Ooh, gimme, I wanna Edward SwissArmyknifehands this shizz.”

Erin giggled and tossed her the still-folded knife.

_There_ was the laugh she was looking for.

-

For a while, the only noise in the kitchen was the sound of Erin dicing potatoes with a butter knife, and the steady squeaking of two rarely-used pairs of miniature scissors snipping green beans over and over and over again.

-

The potatoes were roasting in one pie tin, the green beans in another. Erin was pouring white wine in a saucepan.

“This was supposed to be for drinking,” she said with a sigh.

Holtz snagged the bottle out of her hand and took a swig. “There.”

Erin yanked it back. “There’s still going to be some left. I don’t need the whole bottle.” But after a pause, she took a swig as well before continuing to pour.

She set the bottle down on the counter when she was satisfied, and added some water to the pot, then a few cloves of garlic, then a fragrant herb.

Holtz sidled up to her, resting her chin on her shoulder and her hand on her back. “What herb is that?”

“Dill,” Erin said.

“Ah. I’ve never been good at identifying herbs. Just something I’ve had to _dill_ with in my life.”

“Really? Dill’s pretty distinctive,” Erin murmured, completely missing the pun. She grabbed a straggler off the cutting board and held it up in front of Holtz’s face, presumably for her to smell, not to chomp out of her hand like a horse, which is what she did.

She turned over the herb on her tongue. “Oh, so _that’s_ what dill is. I knew that. Guess herb-identifying isn’t as big of a _dill_ as I thought it was.”

Erin snorted, catching it that time. She ducked out of Holtz’s embrace to go fetch the salmon from the fridge.

-

It seemed a shame to eat such a beautiful meal on the couch, but Holtz didn’t own a table, so there they were.

“Cheers,” Holtz said, a piece of salmon on her fork. She clinked it against Erin’s, and they both took their first bite.

They were silent for a moment, chewing.

“Oh damn,” Holtz said, mouth full. “That is…spectacular.”

She eagerly added some potatoes to the mix before she’d even swallowed, then some of her prized green beans. Then one of the cherry tomatoes that had joined the green beans in the oven for the last five minutes of their cook time.

She blinked in surprise as it burst in her mouth.

Erin paused, eyeing her. “I know cooked tomatoes aren’t everyone’s thing—”

“Those are _amazing_ ,” Holtz said. “What a _delightful_ experience. I have a new favourite vegetable preparation.”

“Tomatoes aren’t vegetables,” Erin said, taking another bite of her own meal.

“Semantics,” Holtz replied with a wave of her hand, popping another roasted tomato in her mouth.

-

“I know it’s getting late and I should get going soon, but—”

“ _Late_ means nothing to me. You can stay as late as you want. You can stay forever.”

Erin laughed lightly like she thought Holtz was joking and folded the tea towel that she’d been drying dishes with, then hung it neatly off the oven door. Holtz was pretty sure she didn’t own any tea towels, so she wasn’t sure where it had come from. “I’m not leaving yet. There’s actually, um, one more thing that I thought we could do, if you want…”

Holtz bounced on her heels. “Hit me.” Something bubbled unexpectedly in her stomach. She recognized it, could name it, even if it wasn’t something she usually experienced. The emotion commonly referred to by humans as _nervousness_.

She followed Erin out of the kitchen and watched her produce two books out of her purse.

“I thought maybe we could read.”

Holtz leaned against the wall. “Here I was, about to congratulate you for curating the most incredible day ever, and then you go and finish it off with one of my least favourite activities?” She clicked her tongue disapprovingly, but winked to let Erin know she was kidding.

Erin looked between the two books in her hands. “No, these are…choices. For you.” She held the books out for Holtz to take. “I thought maybe I could…read to you.”

Holtz silently flipped the books over, studying the backs of them. One was science fiction, the other some sort of steampunk urban fantasy.

“Which…sounds a little demeaning,” Erin said. “I—I didn’t mean it to be demeaning, or to insinuate anything, and—now that I think about it, it was a really stupid idea—you probably aren’t even interested in either of those, but I didn’t know what kind of books you liked so I just took a guess at what I thought you might—well, you don’t even like books, really, so I don’t know why I thought you would—”

“Please read to me,” Holtz said.

Erin faltered. “Really?”

“Yes.” Holtz shoved one of the books at her, not bothering to see which one. They both sounded amazing. “Please.”

“You don’t think it’s demeaning?”

“Not demeaning. It’s sweet. It’s really sweet, Erin. Please read to me.”

Erin flushed slightly. “Okay.”

-

They were curled up on the couch. The Fuzzies were roaming, occasionally weaseling into one of their laps or crawling along their shoulders. Topsoil was purring on the arm of the couch, by Erin’s elbow.

Holtz was on her back, her head in Erin’s lap, her eyes closed. Erin’s steady voice drifted down over her.

She’d tried getting into audiobooks on more than one occasion, but had never been successful, always getting bored and shutting them off within five minutes. The voices were always too grating, too wrong, too male, too slow, too fast, too whatever.

But Erin—she could listen to Erin read forever.

-

Sometimes Erin’s hand tangled absentmindedly in Holtz’s hair in between page turns.

-

Holtz still couldn’t tell you which book she’d selected.

She wasn’t paying much attention to the story.

-

She had no concept of how long Erin read for, but it seemed far too soon when Erin shut the book softly.

“I’m sorry, Holtz,” she said gently. “I’m beat. I need to go.”

“S’alright,” Holtz replied sleepily. She sat up, twisting and rearranging until she was seated facing Erin. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. You—you liked it?”

“You kidding? Erin.” Holtz shuffled closer. “That was amazing. All of this was amazing. This was…the best day of my life.”

She studied her in the dim light of the living room, searching her face for answers to a whole fleet of questions that she wanted to ask.

Erin’s eyes dropped under her scrutinizing gaze. “That’s an exaggeration.”

“No, it’s not. Listen, I don’t usually endorse _thinking_ , as you’re well aware, but…I can tell that you put a lot of thought into this day, and it really means a lot. Every second was kinda perfect.”

“Only… _kinda_ perfect?” Erin teased lightly.

“I tried superlatives earlier, and you dismissed me,” Holtz teased back. “No, you goof. Entirely perfect. 100% perfect. The perfectest.”

“That’s not a word.”

Holtz threw her hands up with mock frustration as Erin laughed.

Then she launched herself at her, wrapping her arms around her waist and folding into her in the clumsiest, most awkwardly-positioned hug ever. Erin let out a little noise of surprise, then her hands found their way around Holtz’s back.

“Thank you,” Holtz whispered against Erin’s chest in the most genuine voice she had in her arsenal.

“Thank _you_ ,” Erin murmured into her hair.

-

“I’m all wet, Holtz! You totally splashed me on purpose!”

“Did noootttt,” Holtz said, fully aware that she had passed up a joke opportunity that five-months-ago Holtz would have sooner dropped dead than missed.

“What the _hell_ is that?”

The two of them both looked over their shoulders at Abby, standing at the top of the stairs.

“This is Agatha Christie’s new home,” Holtz said.

Erin blinked at her. “It’s a male,” she said.

“Why are you trying to force gendered English naming conventions on a fish?”

“Sorry, good point. Agatha Christie it is.”

Abby waved at them. “Can you two quit flirting for like one single second and explain why you thought you could bring a _fish_ into this firehouse without telling us? I get that you’re off on some cutesy side quest or whatever, but you can’t just make decisions like this that affect the rest of the team.”

They exchanged a glance.

“It’s just a fish, Abby,” Erin said. “It’s not like we hired another team member or something.”

Holtz gasped. “Don’t listen to her, Agatha. She didn’t mean it.”

“Also, technically the majority of us agreed to this, so long as we’re all in agreement that Kevin still isn’t a voting member,” Erin explained.

“50% isn’t a _majority_ , you dipstick.”

Erin paused. “Okay, yes, fine—but we still reached quorum.”

Abby groaned. “It’s like trying to argue with a brick wall. I’m just going to walk away and pretend I didn’t see this and let you duke it out with Patty later. Also—you’re about to flood the place.”

“Whoops.” Holtz turned back to the massive tank they were filling with water, which was in fact getting a little sloshy. “Erin, could you—”

“On it.” Erin ran towards the bathroom to shut off the tap, which was connected to 30 feet of rubber tubing that Holtz had found in an alley one time.

The second Erin was gone, Abby gave Holtz a look.

“I know, probably should’ve consulted with you,” Holtz admitted. “But look at how cute he is.” She gestured her chin at the colourful beta fish swimming in circles in the little transport tank.

Abby rolled her eyes. “That wasn’t what that look was for,” she muttered, and then thumped back down the stairs.

“All good,” Erin said, coming back from turning the water off.

Holtz withdrew the other end of the tube from the tank and gave it a shake.

“Okay, that time I _know_ you were trying to get me wet on purpose,” Erin said.

Holtz bit her tongue.

-

“Holtz,” Erin said with an amount of fear in her voice that Holtz had never heard before. “Stay very still.”

Holtz froze. “What? Is there a ghost?”

Erin’s eyes were fixed on a point behind Holtz’s head. Her hands were raised like she was trying to ward something off. “No, there’s…”

There was a little hiss and Erin stumbled back a few steps.

“There’s a feral cat,” Erin gritted out. “It must have climbed in from your balcony or something, it’s—”

Holtz whirled around. “Oh, yes, that’s Patio! The newest member of the family.”

She looked back over her shoulder. Erin was gaping. “You…it…”

“You’re right, she did come in off the balcony. Hence her name.”

“Patios and balconies aren’t the same thing,” Erin said.

“Really, that’s what you want to focus on right now? Alright.”

“Well, I—have so many other questions, like how the hell a cat got onto your fourth-floor balcony?”

“Cat physics is truly a mystery.”

“When did you…acquire her?”

“Let’s see…you were here on what, Saturday? And today’s Wednesday?”

“Yes.”

“So, sometime in between then. Can’t remember which day.”

“And you’re keeping her?”

“Sure am. She’s not chipped—I checked myself using my homemade microchip scanner. Plus, look at her! She’s adorable. And super friendly.”

“She hissed at me.”

“You surprised her.” Holtz dropped into a crouch and let the feline wriggle over to her, nuzzling into her hand. “Hello, babygirl,” she cooed.

Erin hesitated, then took a couple slow and careful steps closer before lowering herself to the floor beside Holtz. She held out her hand. “Hi, Patio.”

“I’ve been calling her Pat.”

“Good call.” Erin made a few soft clicking noises with her tongue, catching the cat’s attention. She wandered over and sniffed at Erin’s hand, then gave it a rub. “Hello, sweet girl. Welcome to the family.” She glanced at Holtz and cleared her throat, blushing. “The Ghostbusters family, I mean.”

Holtz tipped back onto her butt and criss-crossed her legs. Her knee touched Erin’s. Patio flitted between the two of them looking for pets.

“How is she with the Fuzzies and Topsoil?” Erin asked.

“Fast friends, the lot of them. They’re all getting along swimmingly. Took a bit of sniffing around in the beginning, they weren’t quite sure of each other, but now they all love each other. Pat was trying to groom Fuzzy One last night. It was adorable.”

“Wish I could’ve seen that.”

“Well, maybe you need to hang around here even more than you already do,” Holtz said.

“Maybe I do.”

Patio flopped onto her side, purring loudly. Erin scratched under her chin and made a series of nonsensical baby-talk noises.

Topsoil came bumbling over, drawn by all the commotion, and demanded attention as well. Holtz made sure to give him a good helping of it, then left him in Erin’s capable hands and picked herself up off the floor.

“I’m going to go let the Fuzzies out. You wanna cue up something to watch?” She paused. “Unless you wanted to read again?” she asked hopefully.

Erin reached behind her for her purse and dug out the book. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

Holtz punched the air victoriously.

-

Holtz was deeply focused, head bent over her work, when all of a sudden there was someone behind her. Before she could turn, something soft was being draped around her neck.

Her hands came up to touch the rainbow yarn, and she spun her chair to face Erin.

“Happy birthday,” Erin said. “I know it’s a little early, but…”

“Hmm?” Holtz checked her watch. “Only by two hours and six minutes, if you’re aiming for exact birth time?”

“No,” Erin said with a nervous laugh. “I mean that it’s a little early…season wise? For scarves? But, um…it’s your birthday and I told you it was for your birthday so here we are—”

“It’s perfect,” Holtz said, “and I intend to wear it 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Sleeping…showering…making looooOOOoove…” She let her pitch rise and fall for the last word. “I’m never taking it off.”

“Please don’t wear it in the shower,” Erin said. “But, uh, if you do…lay flat to dry.”

Holtz grinned.

-

“You’re going to catch it on fire,” Erin said.

“Am not.”

“Holtz, it’s come within an inch of a flame _four times_ in the last hour since I put it on you. It’s only a matter of time.”

“Erin,” Holtz said very seriously, “do you really think I would let any harm come upon such a thoughtful and labour-intensive present?”

Erin pointed. “Five times.”

“Whoops.” Holtz swept the lit blowtorch out of the way and threw the tail of the scarf over her shoulder.

-

“I can feel you staring at me,” Erin murmured, not taking her eyes off her beloved notebook.

“We should go for a walk,” Holtz blurted.

Erin looked up. “Are you really going to try to convince me that you’ve never been on a _walk_ before?”

“Not everything is for the Mop Log,” Holtz said. “Can’t I just want to go for a walk with you? On my birthday?”

Erin’s cheeks coloured slightly. “Oh. Um. Yeah, of course. Let’s go.”

Holtz nodded her chin at Erin’s desk as she stood up. “You not gonna lock up your pencils?”

Erin held her gaze for a moment. “Not today.”

-

It was a beautiful September day, the kind that basically still felt like summer. Holtz had walked out wearing her lab coat, and regretted it—it was bare-arms kind of weather.

The scarf from Erin hung around her neck, heavy and hot. Sweat was pooling underneath it.

“Just take it off,” Erin begged. “You must be sweltering.”

“I told you, I’m never taking it off.”

“You’re such an idiot,” Erin said with a fond shake of her head.

-

As they walked, Holtz fought impulse after impulse to grab Erin’s hand.

She wasn’t typically in the habit of ignoring impulses, let alone actively working against them, but the fact of the matter was that when it came to Erin, everything meant something. It was a little delicate, a little precarious, a little unstable.

Say what you will about Jillian Holtzmann, but she was always _very_ aware when she was working with something sensitive.

(She just didn’t always care).

-

She finally shoved her hands in her pockets as collateral.

And Erin—pretty much immediately—wove her arm through the V of her elbow, linking them together, her fingers curling tightly around Holtz’s bicep just over her tattoo.

Holtz smiled.

They walked.

-

Holtz got tired of walking eventually and broke into a run, launching herself at a grassy patch in Central Park, where they’d ended up much to her dismay—it was another place she tended to avoid.

She threw herself down onto the grass with all the grace of a haunted ragdoll (they’d found one of those one time—Patty had noped out of there faster than you could say ‘ghost’). Erin caught up to her and hovered.

“Really, Gilbert? Grass stains?” Holtz shrugged off her lab coat before Erin could answer and spread it out beside her.

“Thank you,” Erin mumbled, sinking onto it with considerably more grace. She pulled her knees up.

Holtz flopped backwards onto her back. Her scarf rode up around her neck. She tugged it back down and shielded the sun from her eyes with her hand. She could feel the wholesome tickle of an ant crawling up her arm. She hummed.

She turned her head sideways to get a good look at Erin. She was shielding her eyes from the sun as well, her other arm looped loosely around her knees. It was a fairly windy day, so her hair was tousled and tangled, stuck to her forehead with sweat in a few places.

Holtz swallowed.

“Hey,” she started, but she had no volume, so she cleared her throat and tried again. “Hey, Erin?”

Erin looked down at her, criss-crossing her legs as she did so. Her gaze drifted down to Holtz’s side, and her brow furrowed. Holtz was sure she was about to be scolded for the fact that she was wearing a shirt she’d cut the sides off of but wasn’t wearing a bra underneath—but instead, Erin swiftly grabbed her arm and pulled it into her lap.

“What happened?” she asked.

Holtz assumed she was referring to the still-blistered burn on her forearm. “Temporal displacement weapon got me.”

“Of course it did—it’s completely unstable.”

Holtz chuckled. Erin turned her attention to another scar a few inches away, more healed than the other. She ghosted her fingers along it.

“What about this one?”

“Faulty trap.”

“This one?”

“Proton javelin.”

“This?”

“Toaster.”

On and on it went. Holtz closed her eyes, enjoying the feeling of the sun and Erin’s fingertips on her skin. Soaking it in.

-

“Holtz?”

“Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnmbbbbbbbbb.”

Holtz opened her eyes to Erin’s hand on her shoulder, shaking her gently. She was curled up against her, her arm still dangling in her lap. The sun was gone—not set, but hiding behind some clouds.

She realized that the noises that had come out of her mouth were not, in fact, words from any discernable language, rather a jumble of consonants that didn’t belong together.

“I think you fell asleep,” Erin said before she had a chance to rearrange her phonemes in a more appropriate way. She moved her hand to brush something from Holtz’s face. “And you’ve got grass stuck to your face.”

Holtz could taste it. “Sorry ’bout that,” she drawled.

“Don’t worry about it. You don’t sleep nearly enough.” Erin paused. “Besides, it’s your birthday.”

Holtz hummed.

-

They headed back to the firehouse after Erin expressed concern about sunburn. Not for her, she apparently applied sunscreen every morning like some sort of fully-functioning adult, but for Holtz.

Back inside the relative safety of the building, Erin lingered downstairs, talking to Patty about something, and Holtz bounded up the stairs to the lab.

She came to a stop in front of the Mop Log and stood there, arms crossed, scanning her way through five months of entries penned in everything from nail polish to sparkly gel pen to a pencil that she stole from Erin.

It had been a damn good five months.

She grabbed a blue Sharpie off her desk and twirled it in her hands, resolve hardening with every flip of it.

She heard Erin come up the stairs behind her and say something that she didn’t hear.

She uncapped the Sharpie.

There wasn’t much room left between the bottom of the log and the floor. Holtz kneeled there, inking crammed letters.

Erin looked over with interest. “What are you adding? Don’t tell me you’re trying to put _go for a walk_ on there after all.”

“Nope.” Holtz licked her lips. “It’s something that doesn’t really belong here.”

“Oh?” Erin came closer, craning to try and see.

“The Mop Log is for things that I’ve wanted to do and then immediately done. This is something that I’ve thought about doing for a long time but have never done.”

“I thought you didn’t think about things?” Erin teased.

Holtz stared at the last item on the list and ran her tongue along her teeth.

“It’s cheating to include it, then, right?” Erin prompted. “Whatever it is? If you haven’t done it.”

“I’m going to do it,” Holtz said, capping the marker. “I’m doing it right now.”

“What is it?”

Holtz stood up and threw the marker on her desk. Erin stepped closer, bending to take a look now that Holtz was out of the way.

“Oh.”

Holtz heard the breath whoosh out of her.

She turned to face Erin, those still-foreign nerves bubbling again, and tried to read her face. She wasn’t the best at reading, whether it was words on a page or features on a face, but she was pretty sure her expression was especially unreadable.

Holtz took a little half-step toward her, clearing her throat. “Erin—”

Erin rushed at her, colliding with her so unexpectedly that Holtz actually stumbled back a few steps before righting herself, just in time for Erin to swoop in lips-first.

Their mouths bumped together like bumper cars, or—some other metaphor that Holtz couldn’t quite formulate because _Erin was kissing her_. It was clumsy and messy and weird in the _best fucking way_ and Holtz wrapped her arms around Erin’s back kissed her back with very little finesse but a whole hell of a lot of zeal.

Then it was over and Erin started laughing.

Most people would probably take that as a bad sign, but it was the most beautiful sound in the world to Holtz. She had spent the last five months—well, much longer, really—chasing that laugh.

She was giddy. She felt like a particle inside of an accelerator. Like she couldn’t even comprehend how much energy she had.

She was vibrating, bouncing on the spot, two seconds away from bursting away to dance or run laps or _something_ —and then Erin threw her arms over her shoulders like she had when they were prom-dancing, effectively holding her in place.

Holtz settled for beaming up at her. “ _That_ ,” she said, “was easily my favourite thing on the Mop Log.”

“Mine too,” Erin said.

“And I finally did it! I managed to find something that you hadn’t already done before!”

“Well, first of all, that would have been physically, biologically impossible given the syntax of the sentence,” Erin argued, “but also… _technically—”_

“I do not like that word.”

“—technically _I_ kissed _you_ ,” Erin finished.

“That’s—that’s not true—”

“It definitely is.”

“But I—but—”

“You know I’m right. I _technically_ completed the Mop Log entry before you.”

“But…I thought I’d finally done it,” Holtz said with a pout. “I thought I found something.”

Erin’s brow creased slightly. “Holtz, did—you didn’t do that just for the sake of a Mop Log entry, did you? Because I…”

“Are you kidding? Did you not hear me when I said I’ve wanted to do that for _ages?_ Like, kinda since the second I met you. How’s that for impulse control?” She tapped her temple.

Erin laughed again, her forehead crease ironing out and being replaced with smile lines.

“Oh, that reminds me.” Holtz craned her head to look over Erin’s shoulder and shouted, at the top of her lungs, “ABBY, PATTY, I JUST KISSED ERIN!”

“NO!” Erin shouted immediately.

Holtz pulled back to look at her with a shit-eating grin. “Oh, was I not supposed to say that? Were we keeping it a secret?”

Erin smirked. “ _I_ KISSED _HOLTZ_ , ACTUALLY,” she yelled without breaking eye contact.

“Oh, you little shit,” Holtz said, grin widening.

There was a kind of stunned silence from the first floor.

“ _About fucking time_ ,” Patty finally called.

“ _Love you guys_ ,” Abby added.

“ _Who said that?_ ” Kevin hollered.

They ignored all of them, because Holtz, not to be swindled out of her own Mop Log entry on a technicality, was kissing Erin again. Peppering her with peck after peck after peck, because every time their lips connected there was a little jolt—like the fun, exhilarating kind of zap that some of her projects gave her.

“Stop mucking around and kiss me for real,” Erin mumbled.

Holtz did.

-

“Carter,” Holtz murmured against Erin’s lips an ill-defined amount of time later.

Erin pulled back slightly. “Hmm?”

Holtz snaked her hands up Erin’s back. “My third middle name.”

“Are you telling me all I had to do to earn the last one was kiss you?” Erin groaned. “I should have done this _months_ ago.”

Holtz let out a little growl and pressed her forehead against Erin’s neck. “Agreed.”

“Jillian Susan Henry Carter Holtzmann,” Erin breathed.

Holtz’s head popped up. “You rang?”

Erin kissed her.

-

“So, now that we’re officially dating—wait, right?” Holtz caught Erin’s eyes for confirmation.

Erin nodded. “Have been for a while, I’m pretty sure.”

Holtz lit up and did a little dance in place, shimming her shoulders, moving as much as she could while they still clung to each other. “Now that we’re officially dating, and the Mop Log has kind of wrapped up, will you finally give me some hints on things that we could have done that you haven’t done before?”

Erin pondered that, all while playing with a section of Holtz’s hair. “I want to say no, but I guess it’s only fair…especially considering you were _so bad_ at trying to find something.”

Holtz’s mouth fell open. “Hey, I put all my best brain cells on it!”

Erin gave her a look. “Seriously? I don’t even think you tried at all. There’s _so much_ , Holtz.”

“Please provide supporting evidence to back up your case.”

“Okay, off the top of my head? Uh, how about a language? We could have learned a language.”

“Well, I…I mean, I know a few languages, and you know a few languages, so we probably wouldn’t have found one that—”

“There are 6,500 languages spoken in the world, Holtz. Really? You think between the two of us we already speak all 6,500 languages?”

“Well… _no_ , but…”

“How about Yoruba? Nepalese? Lithuanian? Mazahua?”

“Alright, point taken, but languages take so long to learn,” Holtz whined. “I was more interested in things that could be done in a day.”

“You wrote a book for the Mop Log,” Erin pointed out.

“Whatever. What else have you got besides languages?”

“Uh, let me see. We could have travelled _way_ more.”

“We went to the Grand Canyon,” Holtz protested. “And Michigan!”

“Right. A place that we’d both already been to…and the place where I grew up. Solid attempts.”

“It seemed like a waste of time to figure out where you have and haven’t been,” Holtz mumbled. “You seem so well-traveled.”

“It’s a big planet. There are _plenty_ of places I’ve never been.”

“Whateeever. Travel is also expensive and impractical. Some might have even called it unrealistic.”

Erin shrugged. “Hey, you asked me to give you examples.”

“These are too broad. I want specificity.”

“Fine, there’s tons of other things I’ve never done. Tons of small, standard things. I did tell you to think small.”

“Like whaaaat?”

“I’ve never been go-karting,” Erin said, eyes searching the ceiling as she thought. “I’ve never been mini-golfing. I’ve—”

Holtz’s mouth fell open. “You’ve never been _mini-golfing?_ ”

Erin flushed slightly. “No.”

“You, Erin ‘Caddied a couple summers, owns her own golf gear, came in under par on every single hole’ Gilbert, have _never been mini-golfing?_ ”

“It wasn’t the kind of activity that my family ever did,” Erin said. “I was never invited to anyone’s birthday parties when I was a kid, so I missed my shot there, too. And I’ve never dated anyone who would’ve considered putt-putt an appropriate date activity, so here we are.”

“Here we are,” Holtz said, waggling her eyebrows.

“I’ve never been to an arcade either.”

Holtz let out a dismayed cry. “We could have knocked all three of those off in one single afternoon!”

“Well, I assume _you’ve_ already done them. So they wouldn’t have made it on the Log anyway.”

“They would’ve made it on _your_ Log.” Holtz poked Erin’s chest, then observed the way her face fell slightly. She cocked her head. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, it’s just—” Erin chewed her lip, which had a bit of Holtz’s lipstick smudged on it— “you said…you said that the Mop Log has kind of wrapped up. Did you—did you mean that?”

“Well…I really only started it as an excuse to spend time with you,” Holtz said. “Feels like it’s kinda served it’s purpose.”

“But I…I love going on adventures with you.”

“Oh, the adventures are far from over,” Holtz promised. “S’just now they’re called dates, not Mop Log entries.”

“Weren’t they always?” Erin cracked.

It was clearly meant to be a joke, but Holtz nodded solemnly. “Yes, yes they were. Glad you finally got there.”

Erin snorted and kissed her.

“I _am_ intrigued, though,” Holtz mumbled into it, “about if now we’ve unlocked a whole other world of firsts? Hmm?”

“You’re going to have to find that out for yourself,” Erin replied.

“Oh, now we _need_ to continue the Mop Log. For science.” Holtz pulled back and looked over her shoulder at the wall behind them. “We’re kinda out of space though.”

“We can start a new one,” Erin said. “Although maybe this one should be in a more private place—you know, just in case.”

Holtz cackled all the way into another kiss.

-

“So, about that mini-golf date…” Erin said casually a short while later.

Holtz broke away from her a little reluctantly but grinning nonetheless. Making out could wait until after she’d taken her girlfriend’s putt-putt virginity—or at least until during it. “Ooh, I’m gonna kick your _butt_ , Gilbert.”

“You’re not going to go easy on me?” Erin asked innocently. “It being my first time and all?”

“Not a _chance_. I’ve seen you with a putter. I’ll be giving it all I’ve got.”

“And I’ve seen you take ten tries to get out of a sand trap.” Erin shrugged coyly. “I’m not worried.”

“There are no _sand traps_ in _putt-putt_ , Erin.”

“Well, that’s good for you, then.”

“Oh, it’s on like Donkey Kong—by the way, we are one hundred percent hitting up the arcade afterwards. Even if you probably will destroy me at mini-golf, I fully intend to annihilate you at Dance Dance Revolution.” She broke free of Erin’s embrace to show off some of her moves.

“Bring it on,” Erin replied.

“Oh, I’m bringing it the _hell_ on. Grab your purse and let’s get crackin’. Welcome to dating the Holtzmann way, baby. Ow ow!” She dug her fingers into Erin’s ticklish sides.

Erin squealed and skirted away from her, laughing. “You’re _insufferable_.” She snagged her purse out of her bottom drawer and threw it over her shoulder.

“But you love me.”

Erin rejoined her, pressing a kiss to her cheek before taking her hand and tugging her away from the writing-covered wall.

“Yeah, Holtz. I do.”

_50) Kiss Erin Gilbert_


End file.
